ankush

It means the dog is more likely to harm you than the lion which is dead.

It has a roughly similar meaning to these other proverbs... "better a live coward than a dead hero" or "Discretion is the better part of valour" or "Run a way and live to fight another day."

Ecclesiastes 9:4+5 says: "For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope: for a living dog is better than a dead lion. For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten..." (KJB)

It is better to be a live mongrel than a dead lion.

The mongrel approaches.