During the Warring States period, a war broke out between the states of Qi and Jin.
The battlefield was thick with smoke and the air filled with deafening war cries as both sides clashed fiercely.
During a chaotic battle, a soldier from Ping'a lost his halberd. Losing a weapon in the midst of war was no small matter. Spotting a fallen soldier's spear nearby, he quickly grabbed it and rejoined the fight.
As the troops temporarily withdrew, one soldier trudged along in gloomy silence, lost in thought. A comrade noticed his troubled expression and asked what was wrong. The soldier replied, "I lost my halberd, but later I found a spear. Will it matter? Will my commander punish me?" His companion reassured him, saying, "A halberd is a weapon, and a spear is also a weapon. You lost one weapon and found another—what's the problem?"
The soldier remained uneasy, thinking, "A weapon is a weapon, but I still lost my ji—what should I do?" Just then, Shuwusun, the grandee defending Gaotang, came galloping by. The soldier rushed forward, stopped him, and confessed, "Today in battle, I lost my ji but picked up a spear. Is that a fault?"
The officer scolded, "A halberd is not a spear, and a spear is not a halberd. Losing a halberd and gaining a spear cannot make up for it. Do you think this will escape punishment?" Hearing the officer's words, the soldier felt ashamed of his actions and shouted, "Hey!" He resolved to perform well on the battlefield to reduce his guilt.
When the next battle began, the soldier charged into the enemy ranks with unmatched bravery, fighting valiantly until he fell on the battlefield.
When word spread, the officer felt he had been too harsh with that soldier, yet his courage stirred the officer's blood. The officer declared, "I have heard that when a gentleman puts others through hardship, he must share in their suffering." With that, he cracked his whip, spurred his horse, and charged onto the battlefield to fight alongside his men. Their actions inspired countless soldiers. In the end, the officer, too, fell in battle.
Their otherworldly detachment from worldly affairs won them admiration from later generations. One observer remarked, "If such men were to lead an army, they would never flee; if they were to serve a ruler, they would surely sacrifice themselves for righteousness. They died on the battlefield without achieving great merit—simply because their positions were too lowly. Not everyone in the world is like that soldier or Shuwusun." From this, the idiom "Lost a Halberd, Gained a Spear" emerged, describing a situation where one loses something but gains something else of equal value, or where gains and losses balance out.
Source: *Lüshi Chunqiu*, Chapter "Li Su"
Meaning of the Idiom: Later, the Chinese idiom "亡戟得矛" came to describe a situation where one loses something but gains something else of equal value, or where gains and losses balance out.