For ‘thoughts and prayers’ I think a better translation would be 关心与祝祷.
想法 is more like ‘how one thinks’, one’s thoughts about a subject, or manner of thinking (法 being the key word here for ‘way of doing sth’)
关心 on the other hand conveys what ‘thoughts’ in the English does, i.e. it means care, keeping 关something close to one’s heart 心 (which was the locus of thought in classical Chinese philosophy) other translations I saw are 关怀 for thoughts, where huai is also one’s heart/chest/bosom
(I’m not a native speaker so even 关心与祝祷 sounds a bit skewiff to me, I looked at other online translations and they don’t translate directly, they translate phrasally e.g.
Our thoughts and prayers are with them in this time of grief.
在这悲伤的时刻 我们心中想到他们 并为他们祈祷。
lit. in this grief (possessive modifer) moment our hearts think (prep*, ‘to > of’) them, also (prep, ‘towards, for’) them pray
*I’m not sure how to grammatically mark it. It’s not a particle, it’s like a completional verbal complement, it’s used here to show that ‘they’ have been thought ‘of’ (想到 think/arrive > think/complete). It’s been a while since I studied
It’s also as distinct to 想+sbdy/sth which means to ‘miss’ someone (as in, you’re thinking of them because they aren’t there), i.e. 我想你 I miss you, 我想家 I’m homesick (I’m thinking of home)
Unsolicited translation advice
For ‘thoughts and prayers’ I think a better translation would be 关心与祝祷.
想法 is more like ‘how one thinks’, one’s thoughts about a subject, or manner of thinking (法 being the key word here for ‘way of doing sth’)
关心 on the other hand conveys what ‘thoughts’ in the English does, i.e. it means care, keeping 关something close to one’s heart 心 (which was the locus of thought in classical Chinese philosophy) other translations I saw are 关怀 for thoughts, where huai is also one’s heart/chest/bosom
(I’m not a native speaker so even 关心与祝祷 sounds a bit skewiff to me, I looked at other online translations and they don’t translate directly, they translate phrasally e.g.
lit. in this grief (possessive modifer) moment our hearts think (prep*, ‘to > of’) them, also (prep, ‘towards, for’) them pray
*I’m not sure how to grammatically mark it. It’s not a particle, it’s like a completional verbal complement, it’s used here to show that ‘they’ have been thought ‘of’ (想到 think/arrive > think/complete). It’s been a while since I studied
It’s also as distinct to 想+sbdy/sth which means to ‘miss’ someone (as in, you’re thinking of them because they aren’t there), i.e. 我想你 I miss you, 我想家 I’m homesick (I’m thinking of home)
DuChinese says I know 1900 words made from 953 characters
加油! You got this