They just happened to be in the moat when the city started burning
城門失火，殃及池魚 chéngménshīhuǒ, yāngjíchíyú - bring disaster to innocent people
The saying originates from a story about a city in the Spring and Autumn period. A fire came out of control and the inhabitants had no choice other than to extinguish it using the water in the moat surrounding the city. When they succeeded in putting out the fire, the moat was dried up and the fish were left flopping around in the remaining mud pits until they died a few days later.
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By pairs, do you mean that they are best used together? If so, in what order?
ReplyDeleteYes and no, when I say they come in pairs I just mean that they are a set of idioms, like 塞翁失馬，焉知非福, 路不拾遺，夜不閉戶 or 放下屠刀，立地成佛. I believe just using one of the two is okay with all of these (and the semantic meaning would be roughly the same), when and where to use both would depend on context.
ReplyDeleteIn this particular case the order is 城門失火，殃及池魚, I've modified the post to show it