Several parts combine into one character.

律 is a compound ideograph: 彳 (the "step" radical, depicting walking) + 聿 (a brush held in hand). The composite reads as "steps in measured rhythm + brush carefully writing" = the regulated norm written down. Remarkably, the Chinese conception encoded a single word 律 to mean BOTH legal rule (法律) AND musical rhythm / scale (音律). This bifurcation reveals a deep cosmological assumption in East Asian thought: the patterns of governance and the patterns of music share the same essential structure — both are ways of bringing order to chaos through measured cadence. The 律呂 (lǜlǚ) system of twelve musical pitches in classical Chinese music theory was conceived as the same kind of discipline as the legal code.

Korean reading "yul" (or "ryul" classically). 法律 (beomnyul, law — alongside 법령 beomnyeong and 법규 beopgyu, 법률 is the standard formal Korean term for "law"), 規律 (gyuyul, discipline / regulation — used for personal discipline as well as institutional rules), 律動 (yuldong, rhythmic movement — used in dance and physical-education vocabulary), 韻律 (ullyul, meter / rhyme — poetry analysis term), 一律 (illyul, "all of one rule" = uniformly / across the board), 音律 (eumnyul, musical scale / tonality).

Mandarin lǜ, 4th tone. 法律 (fǎlǜ, law), 规律 (guīlǜ, rule / regularity / pattern), 一律 (yīlǜ, uniformly), 律师 (lǜshī, "rule-master" = lawyer — central to modern Chinese legal vocabulary; the rise of 律师 as a profession in China since the 1980s reform era). 自律 (zìlǜ, self-discipline) is also widely used in Chinese personal and institutional vocabulary.

Japanese on-reading リツ (ritsu) — 法律 (hōritsu, law), 規律 (kiritsu, discipline / order), 律動 (ritsudō, rhythm), 自律 (jiritsu, self-discipline / autonomy). Alternative on-reading リチ (richi) appears in 律義 (richigi, "lawful righteousness" = honest and faithful, scrupulously dutiful — a moral compliment in Japanese: 律義な人 richigi na hito, "an honorable straight-arrow person"). The duality of legal-and-musical rhythm survives in 音律 (onritsu, musical scale).

Memory aid: walking (彳) plus a brush (聿) — measured steps and careful writing produce both laws and rhythms.