SEE NO EVIL, HEAR NO EVIL, SPEAK NO EVIL

Mizaru, Kikazaru, Iwazaru

See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil
Eich! See evil, hear no evil and speak no evil

After school, my librarians, John, Hemarah and Vinod came to the library to see me and they kept telling me about the Three Wise Monkeys. They even went as far as to demonstrate the actions of the monkeys for the photographs above. So, tonight I have decided to do a post about them. Not my the boys but the three monkeys.

THE THREE WISE MONKEYS

The three wise monkeys (Japanese: 三猿, san'en or sanzaru, or 三匹の猿, sanbiki no saru, literally "three monkeys") are a pictorial maxim. Together they embody the proverbial principle to "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil". The three monkeys are Mizaru, covering his eyes, who sees no evil; Kikazaru, covering his ears, who hears no evil; and Iwazaru, covering his mouth, who speaks no evil.
Sometimes there is a fourth monkey depicted with the three others; the last one, Shizaru, symbolizes the principle of "do no evil". He may be covering his abdomen or crotch, or just crossing his arms.

Origin

The source that popularized this pictorial maxim is a 17th century carving over a door of the famous Tōshō-gū shrine in Nikkō, Japan. The maxim, however, probably originally came to Japan with a Tendai-Buddhist legend, possibly from India via China in the 8th century (Yamato Period).
In Chinese, a similar phrase exists in the Analects of Confucius: "Look not at what is contrary to propriety; listen not to what is contrary to propriety; speak not what is contrary to propriety; make no movement which is contrary to propriety" (非禮勿視， 非禮勿聽，非禮勿言， 非禮勿動).It may be that this phrase was shortened and simplified after it was brought into Japan.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/See_no_evil,_hear_no_evil,_speak_no_evil