by Wu Cheng-En
The happy meeting of the Three Stars was predestined;
It was fated that the four monks would encounter one another.
Now that they have eaten the manfruit at this feast,
They will all enjoy everlasting youth.
The Bodhisattva and the Three Stars ate one each, as did the Tang Priest, who realized at last that this was an Immortal's treasure, and Monkey, Pig and Friar Sand. Master Zhen Yuan had one to keep them company and the Immortals of the temple divided the last one between them. Monkey thanked the Bodhisattva, who went back to Potaraka, and saw the Three Stars off on their journey home to the island of Penglai.
Master Zhen Yuan set out some non-alcoholic wine and made Monkey his sworn brother. This was a case of “if you don't fight you can't make friends,” and their two households were now united. That night Sanzang and his disciples went to bed feeling very happy. That venerable priest had now
Been lucky enough to eat the Grass-returning Cinnabar,
Gaining long life, and resistance to fiends and monsters.
Listen to the next installment to hear how they took their leave the next day.
Chapter 27
The Corpse Fiend Thrice Tricks Tang Sanzang
The Holy Monk Angrily Dismisses the Handsome Monkey King
At dawn the next day Sanzang and his three disciples packed their things before setting off. Now that Master Zhen Yuan had made Monkey his sworn brother and was finding him so congenial, he did not want to let him go, so he entertained him for another five or six days. Sanzang had really become a new man, and was livelier and healthier now that he had eaten the Grass-returning Cinnabar. His determination to fetch the scriptures was too strong to let him waste any more time, so there was nothing for it but to be on their way.
Soon after they had set out again, master and disciples saw a high mountain in front of them. “I'm afraid that the mountain ahead may be too steep for the horse,” Sanzang said, “so we must think this over carefully.”
“Don't worry, master,” said Monkey, “we know how to cope.” He went ahead of the horse with his cudgel over his shoulder and cleared a path up to the top of the cliff. He saw no end of
Row upon row of craggy peaks,
Twisting beds of torrents.
Tigers and wolves were running in packs,
Deer and muntjac moving in herds.
Countless river-deer darted around.
And the mountains was covered with fox and hare.
Thousand-food pythons,
Ten-thousand-fathom snakes;
The great pythons puffed out murky clouds,
The enormous snakes breathed monstrous winds.
Brambles and thorns spread beside the paths,
Pines and cedars stood elegant on the ridge.
There were wild fig-trees wherever the eye could see,
And sweet-scented flowers as far as the horizon.
The mountain's shadow fell North of the ocean,
The clouds parted South of the handle of the Dipper.
The towering cliffs were as ancient as the primal Essence,
The majestic crags cold in the sunlight.
Sanzang was immediately terrified, so Monkey resorted to some of his tricks. He whirled his iron cudgel and roared, at which all the wolves, snakes, tigers and leopards fled. They then started up the mountain, and as they were crossing a high ridge Sanzang said to Monkey, “Monkey, I've been hungry all day, so would you please go and beg some food for us somewhere.”
“You aren't very bright, master,” Monkey replied with a grin. “We're on a mountain with no village or inn for many miles around. Even if we had money there would be nowhere to buy food, so where am I to go and beg for it?” Sanzang felt cross, so he laid into Monkey. “You ape,” he said, “don't you remember how you were crushed by the Buddha in a stone cell under the Double Boundary Mountain, where you could talk but not walk? It was I who saved your life, administered the monastic vows to you, and made you my disciple. How dare you be such a slacker? Why aren't you prepared to make an effort?”
“I always make an effort,” said Monkey. “I'm never lazy.”
“If you're such a hard worker, go and beg some food for us. I can't manage on an empty stomach. Besides, with the noxious vapors on this mountain we'll never reach the Thunder Monastery,”
“Please don't be angry, master, and stop talking. I know your obstinate character-if I'm too disobedient you'll say that spell. You'd better dismount and sit here while I find somebody and beg for some food.”
Monkey leapt up into the clouds with a single jump, and shading his eyes with his hand he looked around. Unfortunately he could see nothing in any direction except emptiness. There was no village or house or any other sign of human habitation among the countless trees. After looking for a long time he made out a high mountain away to the South. On its Southern slopes was a bright red patch.
Monkey brought his cloud down and said, “Master, there's something to eat.” Sanzang asked him what it was. “There's no house around here where we could ask for food,” Monkey replied, “but there's a patch of red on a mountain to the South that I'm sure must be ripe wild peaches. I'll go and pick some-they'll fill you up.”
“A monk who has peaches to eat is a lucky man,” said Sanzang. Monkey picked up his bowl and leapt off on a beam of light. Just watch as he flashes off in a somersault, a whistling gust of cold air. Within a moment he was picking peaches on the Southern mountain.
There is a saying that goes, “If the mountain is high it's bound to have fiends; if the ridge is steep spirits will live there.” This mountain did indeed have an evil spirit who was startled by Monkey's appearance. It strode through the clouds on a negative wind, and on seeing the venerable Sanzang on the ground below thought happily, “What luck, what luck. At home they've been talking for years about a Tang Monk from the East who's going to fetch the 'Great Vehicle'; he's a reincarnation of Golden Cicada, and has an Original Body that has been purified through ten lives. Anyone who eats a piece of his flesh will live for ever. And today, at last, he's here.” The evil spirit went forward to seize him, but the sight of the two great generals to Sanzang's left and right made it frightened to close in on him. Who, it wondered, were they? They were in fact Pig and Friar Sand, and for all that their powers were nothing extraordinary, Pig was really Marshal Tian Peng while Friar Sand was the Great Curtain-lifting General. It was because their former awe-inspiring qualities had not yet been dissipated that the fiend did not close in. “I'll try a trick on them and see what happens,” the spirit said to itself.
The splendid evil spirit stopped its negative wind in a hollow and changed itself into a girl with a face as round as the moon and as pretty as a flower. Her brow was clear and her eyes beautiful; her teeth were white and her lips red. In her left hand she held a blue earthenware pot and in her right a green porcelain jar. She headed East towards the Tang Priest.
The holy monk rested his horse on the mountain,
And suddenly noticed a pretty girl approaching.
The green sleeves over her jade fingers lightly billowed;
Golden lotus feet peeped under her trailing skirt.
The beads of sweat on her powdered face were dew on a flower,
Her dusty brow was a willow in a mist.
Carefully and closely he watched her
As she came right up to him.
“Pig, Friar Sand,” said Sanzang when he saw her, “don't you see somebody coming although Monkey said that this was a desolate and uninhabited place?”
“You and Friar Sand stay sitting here while I go and take a look.” The blockhead laid down his rake, straightened his tunic, put on the airs of a gentleman, and stared at the girl as he greeted her. Although he had not been sure from a distance, he could now see clearly that the girl had
Bones of jade under skin as pure as ice,
A creamy bosom revealed by her neckline.
Her willow eyebrows were black and glossy,
; And silver stars shone from her almond eyes.
She was as graceful as the moon,
As pure as the heavens.
Her body was like a swallow in a willow-tree,
Her voice like an oriole singing in the wood.
She was wild apple-blossom enmeshing the sun,
An opening peony full of the spring.
When the idiot Pig saw how beautiful she was his earthly desires were aroused, and he could not hold back the reckless words that came to his lips. “Where are you going, Bodhisattva,” he said, “and what's that you're holding?” Although she was obviously an evil fiend he could not realize it.
“Venerable sir,” the girl replied at once, “this blue pot is full of tasty rice, and the green jar contains fried wheat-balls. I've come here specially to fulfil a vow to feed monks.” Pig was thoroughly delighted to hear this. He came tumbling back at breakneck speed and said to Sanzang,
“Master, 'Heaven rewards the good'. When you sent my elder brother off begging because you felt hungry, that ape went fooling around somewhere picking peaches. Besides, too many peaches turn your stomach and give you the runs. Don't you see that this girl is coming to feed us monks?”
“You stupid idiot,” replied Sanzang, who was not convinced, “we haven't met a single decent person in this direction, so where could anyone come from to feed monks?”
“What's she then, master?” said Pig.
When Sanzang saw her he sprang to his feet, put his hands together in front of his chest, and said, “Bodhisattva, where is your home? Who are you? What vow brings you here to feed monks?” Although she was obviously an evil spirit, the venerable Sanzang could not see it either. On being asked about her background by Sanzang, the evil spirit immediately produced a fine-sounding story with which to fool him.
“This mountain, which snakes and wild animals won't go near, is called White Tiger Ridge,” she said. “Our home lies due West from here at the foot of it. My mother and father live there, and they are devout people who read the scriptures and feed monks from far and near. As they had no son, they asked Heaven to bless them. When I was born they wanted to marry me off to a good family, but then they decided to find me a husband who would live in our home to look after them in their old age and see them properly buried.”
“Bodhisattva, what you say can't be right,” replied Sanzang. “The Analects say, 'When father and mother are alive, do not go on long journeys; if you have to go out, have a definite aim.' As your parents are at home and have found you a husband, you should let him fulfil your vow for you. Why ever are you walking in the mountains all by yourself, without even a servant? This is no way for a lady to behave.”
The girl smiled and produced a smooth reply at once: “My husband is hoeing with some of our retainers in a hollow in the North of the mountain, reverend sir, and I am taking them this food I've cooked. As it's July and all the crops are ripening nobody can be spared to run errands, and my parents are old, so I'm taking it there myself. Now that I have met you three monks from so far away, I would like to give you this food as my parents are so pious. I hope you won't refuse our paltry offering.”
“It's very good of you,” said Sanzang, “but one of my disciples has gone to pick some fruit and will be back soon, so we couldn't eat any of your food. Besides, if we ate your food your husband might be angry with you when he found out, and we would get into trouble too.”
As the Tang Priest was refusing to eat the food, the girl put on her most charming expression and said, “My parents' charity to monks is nothing compared to my husband's, master. He is a religious man whose lifelong pleasure has been repairing bridges, mending roads, looking after the aged, and helping the poor. When he hears that I have given you this food, he'll love me more warmly than ever.” Sanzang still declined to eat it.
Pig was beside himself. Twisting his lips into a pout, he muttered indignantly, “Of all the monks on earth there can't be another as soft in the head as our master. He won't eat ready-cooked food when there are only three of us to share it between. He's waiting for that ape to come back, and then we'll have to split it four ways.” Without allowing any more discussion he tipped the pot towards his mouth and was just about to eat.
At just this moment Brother Monkey was somersaulting back with his bowl full of the peaches he had picked on the Southern mountain. When he saw with the golden pupils in his fiery eyes that the girl was an evil spirit, he put the bowl down, lifted his cudgel, and was going to hit her on the head when the horrified Sanzang held him back and said, “Who do you think you're going to hit?”
“That girl in front of you is no good,” he replied. “She's an evil spirit trying to make a fool of you.”
“In the old days you had a very sharp eye, you ape,” Sanzang said, “but this is nonsense. This veritable Bodhisattva is feeding us with the best of motives, so how can you call her an evil spirit?”
“You wouldn't be able to tell, master,” said Monkey with a grin. “When I was an evil monster in the Water Curtain Cave I used to do that if I wanted a meal of human flesh. I would turn myself into gold and silver, or a country mansion, or liquor, or a pretty girl. Whoever was fool enough to be besotted with one of these would fall in love with me, and I would lure them into the cave, where I did what I wanted with them. Sometimes I ate them steamed and sometimes boiled, and what I couldn't finish I used to dry in the sun against a rainy day. If I'd been slower getting here, master, you'd have fallen into her snare and she'd have finished you off.” The Tang Priest refused to believe him and maintained that she was a good person.
“I know you, master,” said Monkey. “Her pretty face must have made you feel randy. If that's the way you feel, tell Pig to fell a few trees and send Friar Sand look off to for some grass. I'll be the carpenter, and we'll build you a hut here that you and the girl can use as your bridal chamber. We can all go our own ways. Wouldn't marriage be a worthwhile way of living? Why bother plodding on to fetch some scriptures or other?” Sanzang, who had always been such a soft and virtuous man, was unable to take this. He was so embarrassed that he blushed from his shaven pate to his ears.
While Sanzang was feeling so embarrassed, Monkey flared up again and struck at the evil spirit's face. The fiend, who knew a trick or two, used a magic way of abandoning its body: when it saw Monkey's cudgel coming it braced itself and fled, leaving a false corpse lying dead on the ground.
Sanzang shook with terror and said to himself, “That monkey is utterly outrageous. Despite all my good advice he will kill people for no reason at all.”
“Don't be angry, master,” said Monkey. “Come and see what's in her pot.” Friar Sand helped Sanzang over to look, and he saw that far from containing tasty rice it was full of centipedes with long tails. The jar had held not wheat-balls but frogs and toads, which were now jumping around on the ground. Sanzang was now beginning to believe Monkey.
This was not enough, however, to prevent a furious Pig from deliberately making trouble by saying, “Master, that girl was a local countrywoman who happened to meet us while she was taking some food to the fields. There's no reason to think that she was an evil spirit. My elder brother was trying his club out on her, and he killed her by mistake. He's deliberately trying to trick us by magicking the food into those things because he's afraid you'll recite the Band-tightening spell. He's fooled you into not saying it.”
This brought the blindness back on Sanzang, who believed these trouble-making remarks and made the magic with his hand as he recited the spell. “My head's aching, my head's aching,” Monkey said. “Stop, please stop. Tell me off if you like.”
“I've nothing to say to you,” replied Sanzang. “A man of religion should always help others, and his thoughts should always be virtuous. When sweeping the floor you must be careful not to kill any ants, and to spare the moth you should put gauze round your lamp. Why do you keep murdering people? If you are going to kill innocent people like that there is no point in your going to fetch the scriptures. G
o back!”
“Where am I to go back to?” Monkey asked.
“I won't have you as my disciple any longer,” said Sanzang.
“If you won't have me as your disciple,” Monkey said, “I'm afraid you may never reach the Western Heaven.”
“My destiny is in Heaven's hands,” replied Sanzang. “If some evil spirit is fated to cook me, he will; and there's no way of getting out of it. But if I'm not to be eaten, will you be able to extend my life? Be off with you at once.”
“I'll go if I must,” said Monkey, “but I'll never have repaid your kindness to me.”
“What kindness have I ever done you?” Sanzang asked.
Monkey knelt down and kowtowed. “When I wrecked the Heavenly Palace,” he said, “I put myself in a very dangerous position, and the Buddha crashed me under the Double Boundary Mountain. Luckily the Bodhisattva Guanyin administered the vows to me, and you, master, released me, so if I don't go with you to the Western Heaven I'll look like a 'scoundrel who doesn't return a kindness, with a name that will be cursed for ever.'”
As Sanzang was a compassionate and holy monk this desperate plea from Monkey persuaded him to relent. “In view of what you say I'll let you off this time, but don't behave so disgracefully again. If you are ever as wicked as that again I shall recite that spell twenty times over.”
“Make it thirty if you like,” replied Monkey. “I shan't hit anyone else.” With that he helped Sanzang mount the horse and offered him some of the peaches he had picked. After eating a few the Tang Priest felt less hungry for the time being.
The evil spirit rose up into the air when it had saved itself from being killed by Monkey's cudgel. Gnashing its teeth in the clouds, it thought of Monkey with silent hatred: “Now I know that those magical powers of his that I've been hearing about for years are real. The Tang Priest didn't realize who I was and would have eaten the food. If he'd so much as leant forward to smell it I could have seized him, and he would have been mine. But that Monkey turned up, wrecked my plan, and almost killed me with his club. If I spare that monk now I'll have gone to all that trouble for nothing, so I'll have another go at tricking him.”