The Journey to the West, Revised Edition, Volume 3

by Unknown

  Dear Great Sage! He gave his ear a rub and brought out a tiny embroidery needle. “Sirs,” he said, “I’m someone who has left the family, and I haven’t any travel money with me. I have only this needle, which I’ll be glad to give to you.” “What rotten luck!” said the bandit. “We released a wealthy priest and we have caught instead this poor, bald ass! You must be quite good at tailoring, I suppose. What do I need a needle for?”

  When Pilgrim heard that he did not want the needle, he waved it once in his hand and it changed immediately into a rod with the thickness of a rice bowl. Growing fearful, the bandit said, “Though this monk appears to be young, he knows magic.” Sticking the rod into the ground, Pilgrim said to them, “If any of you can pick it up, it’s yours.” The two bandit chiefs at once went forward to try to grab it, but alas, it was as if dragonflies were attempting to shake a stone pillar. They could not even budge it half a whit! This rod, you see, happened to be the compliant golden-hooped rod, which tipped the scale in Heaven at thirteen thousand, five hundred pounds. How could those bandits have knowledge of this? The Great Sage walked forward and picked up the rod with no effort at all. Assuming the style of the Python Rearing its Body, he pointed at the bandits and said, “Your luck’s running out, for you have met old Monkey!” One of the bandit chiefs approached him and gave him another fifty or sixty blows. “Your hands must be getting tired!” chuckled Pilgrim. “Let old Monkey give you one stroke of the rod. I won’t do it for real either!” Look at him! One wave of the rod and it grew to about seventy feet, its circumference almost as big as a well. He banged it on the bandit, and he at once fell to the ground: his lips hugging the earth, he could not make another sound.

  The other bandit chiefs shouted, “This baldy is so audacious! He has no travel money, but he has killed one of us instead!” “Don’t fret! Don’t fret!” said Pilgrim, laughing. “I’ll hit every one of you, just to make sure that all of you will be wiped out!” With another bang he beat to death the other bandit chief. Those small thieves were so terrified that they abandoned their weapons and fled for their lives in all directions.

  We tell you now about that Tang Monk, who rode toward the east and was caught by Eight Rules and Sha Monk. “Master,” they said, “where are you going? You are heading in the wrong direction.” The elder pulled in his reins, saying, “Oh, disciples, go quickly and tell your elder brother to be merciful with his rod. Tell him not to kill all those bandits.” “Master, stay here,” said Eight Rules, “and let me go.” Idiot ran all the way back to the spot, shouting, “Elder Brother, Master tells you not to hit people.” “Brother,” said Pilgrim, “since when have I hit any people?”

  “Where did those bandits go?” asked Eight Rules. Pilgrim replied: “All of them have scattered, but there are two of them sleeping here.” “Plague on you two!” said Eight Rules with a laugh. “You must have been up all night, if you can take hardship like this! Why not go elsewhere? Of all places, you have to sleep here!” Idiot walked up to them and took a closer look. “They are just like me,” he said, “sleeping soundly with their mouths open, they are drooling just a little.” “One stroke of old Monkey’s rod,” said Pilgrim, “has brought out their bean curd!” “How could there be bean curd in people’s heads?” asked Eight Rules. Pilgrim replied, “I beat their brains out!”

  On hearing this, Eight Rules ran back hurriedly to say to the Tang Monk, “They have disbanded!” “My goodness! My goodness!” said Tripitaka. “Which road did they take?” Eight Rules said, “They have been beaten until their legs are stiff and straight. You think they can walk somewhere?” “Why, then, did you say that they have disbanded?” asked Tripitaka.

  “They have been beaten to death!” said Eight Rules. “Isn’t that disbanding?” “How do they look now?” asked Tripitaka again, and Eight Rules said, “Two gaping holes in their heads.” “Untie the wrap,” said Tripitaka, “and take out a few pennies. Go somewhere quickly and see if you can buy two tapes with ointment to tape them up.” “You aren’t serious,” said Eight Rules, laughing. “Ointment can be taped on living people for their sores or boils. How could you cure the gaping holes of dead men?” “Are they really beaten to death?” asked Tripitaka, and he became terribly upset, so much so that he began to berate Pilgrim under his breath, calling him wretched ape and miserable simian as he turned around the horse. Soon, he and his two disciples arrived at the spot where they found two bloody corpses lying beneath the mountain slope.

  Unable to bear the sight, the elder at once commanded Eight Rules: “Use your muckrake quickly and dig a hole to bury them. I’ll recite for them a scroll of scripture for the dead.” “You’ve asked the wrong man, Master,” said Eight Rules. “It was Pilgrim who killed these people, and he should be asked to bury them. Why do you make old Hog the grave-digger?” Pilgrim, however, was irritated by his master’s castigations, and therefore he shouted at Eight Rules, “You lazy coolie! Bury them quickly! A little tardiness and you, too, will get the rod!” Horrified, Idiot began digging at once beneath the slope. After the hole had reached a depth of about three feet, rocks and boulders in the ground resisted the rake. Abandoning his tool, our Idiot resorted to his snout to remove the rocks. When he hit the soft element again, one shove of his snout took away about two and a half feet of dirt and two shoves created a hole of about five feet. Thus the two bandits were buried and a mound was raised. “Wukong,” Tripitaka called out, “bring me some incense and candles, so that I may say a prayer and recite the scriptures.” “What silliness!” said Pilgrim, pouting. “Halfway up this mountain, when there is no village in front and no store behind us, where can I ask for incense and candles? There’s no place for us to buy some even if we have the money.” “Move aside, ape head!” said Tripitaka spitefully. “Let me pinch s ome dirt to use as incense and then I’ll pray.” And so,

  Tripitaka left the saddle to mourn at a rustic grave;

  The sage monk in kindness prayed to a lonely mound.

  This was his supplication:

  I bow to you noble ones,

  Listen to all my reasons:

  Have regard for this student,

  From the East a Tang person.

  The emperor Taizong by his own decree

  To fetch scripture texts from the West sent me.

  I came to this very place

  And met you all face to face—

  Natives of some prefecture or some district

  Who have formed a gang on this hilly place.

  With good words and kind

  I begged you earnestly,

  But you wouldn’t change your mind

  And instead grew so angry.

  When you met up with Pilgrim,

  Two of you fell by his rod.

  I pity greatly your corpses exposed,

  And I cover you with moundfuls of sod.

  I break bamboo for candles—

  Though lightless,

  They mean well.

  I take stones for offerings;

  Though tasteless,

  Truth they tell.

  If you should protest at the Hall of Darkness

  And dig up the past,

  Remember that his name is Sun

  And my name is Chen.

  A wrong has its wrongdoer,

  And a debt its creditor.

  Please don’t accuse this scripture seeker!

  “Master,” said Eight Rules, chuckling, “you have neatly passed the buck! But when he hit these people, we weren’t around either.”

  Tripitaka indeed scattered another pinch of dirt and prayed: “Noble ones, when you file suit, file it against Pilgrim only. Eight Rules and Sha Monk have nothing to do with this.” When the Great Sage heard these words, he could no longer refrain from snickering. “Master,” he said, “there’s not much kindness in you, is there? Because of your enterprise of seeking scriptures, I don’t know how much energy or exertion I’ve spent. Now I’ve slaughtered these two crummy thieves, and you tell them instead to go file suit agains
t old Monkey. Though it was I who raised my hands to kill them, I did it only for you. If you hadn’t resolved to go to acquire scriptures in the Western Heaven, and if I hadn’t become your disciple, how could I end up killing people at this place? Now that you have said all those things, I might as well give them a little benediction!” He lifted up his iron rod and pounded it three times on the grave mound, saying, “You plague-ridden bandits! Listen to me! You gave me seven whacks here and eight whacks there with your rods, beating me until I was sorely annoyed because your blows caused me neither itch nor pain. So, I made the mistake of beating you to death. You may go anywhere you like to file suit against me, but old Monkey is not afraid.

  The Jade Emperor knows me;

  The devarājas follow me;

  The Twenty-Eight Constellations fear me;

  The Nine Luminaries are afraid of me;

  The prefectural, district, and municipal deities kneel before me;

  Equal to Heaven, the guardian of Mount Tai dreads me;

  The Ten Kings of Hell once served as my attendants;

  The Five Grand Deities5 have been my houseboys;

  Whether they be Five Bureaus of the Three Realms,6

  Or the Sundry Gods of the Ten Quarters,7

  They regard me as an intimate friend.

  You may go anywhere you like to lodge your complaint!”

  When Tripitaka heard him using such strong language, he was quite shocked. “Oh, disciple,” he said, “my prayer was meant to make you appreciate the reverence for life and become a virtuous person. Why are you taking it so hard?” “Master,” replied Pilgrim, “what you’ve said is no joke! Anyway, let’s go find shelter for the night.” Still nursing his anger, the elder forced himself to mount the horse.

  Thus the Great Sage Sun harbored feelings of hostility, while Eight Rules and Sha Monk, too, were swayed by enmity. In fact, master and disciples, as they followed the main road westward, only appeared to be cordial. Presently a village north of the road came into sight, and, pointing with his whip, Tripitaka said, “Let’s go over there to ask for shelter.” “Very good,” replied Eight Rules.

  They went up to the village where the Tang Monk dismounted. As they looked about, they found that it was a rather nice place after all. You see

  On the path wild blooms parade;

  Motley trees the door blockade.

  Mountain streams from distant banks flow;

  On level fields mallow and wheat grow.

  Sedge and reed dew-moistened, a small gull rests.

  Willows in gentle breeze, a tired bird nests.

  Fresh cedars, pine-studded, rival in green.

  Red smartweeds’ bright hues with rushes are seen.

  Village dogs bark;

  Vesper cocks crow;

  Cattle well-fed, cowboys now homeward go.

  Yellow millet’s cooked for smoke’s in sight

  From mountain homes at time of fading light.

  As the elder walked forward, he saw an old man emerging from one of the village huts. The elder immediately greeted him, and the old man asked, “Where does the priest come from?” “This humble cleric,” replied Tripitaka, “is someone sent by imperial commission to seek scriptures in the Western Heaven. It is getting late as I pass through your honored region, and that is why I have come to ask for a night’s lodging.” With a chuckle, the old man said, “It is an enormous journey from your place to mine. How is it that you have scaled the mountains and forded the waters all by yourself?” “This humble cleric,” said Tripitaka, “also has three disciples in my company.”

  “Where are your honored disciples?” asked the old man, and Tripitaka pointed with his hand to reply, “Those three standing near the main road.” Lifting his head, the old man discovered how hideous they looked and he immediately turned to try to flee inside. He was caught by Tripitaka, however, who said, “Old patron, I beg you to be merciful. Please grant us shelter for one night.” Trembling all over, the old man could hardly speak. He waved his head and his hand, saying, “No! No! No! These can’t be human beings! They must be monster-spirits!”

  Attempting to placate him with a smile, Tripitaka said, “Please don’t be afraid, patron. My disciples are born like that. They are not monster-spirits.” “Oh, my father!” cried the old man. “One is a yakṣa, one is a horse-face, and one is a thunder squire.” On hearing this, Pilgrim shouted back, “The thunder squire is my grandson, the yakṣa is my great-grandson, and the horse-face is my great-great grandson.” When the old man heard this, his spirit left him and his soul fled; his face drained of all color, he only wanted to go inside. Tripitaka took hold of him and entered the thatched hall. Smiling again, he said, “Old Patron, don’t be afraid of them. All of them are quite rude, and they don’t know how to speak properly.”

  As he was thus trying to pacify the old man, an old woman leading a child about five or six years old walked out from the rear. “Papa,” she said, “why are you fretting like that?” Only then did the old man say, “Mama, bring us some tea.” The old woman indeed left the child behind to go inside and brought out two cups of tea. After he drank it, Tripitaka turned to bow to the old woman, saying, “This humble cleric is someone sent by the Great Tang of the Land of the East to go acquire scriptures in the Western Heaven. I just arrived in your region and wanted to beg from you a night’s lodging. Because my three disciples are rather ugly in their appearances, the elder of your family has been struck with false alarm.” “If you are so intimidated by ugly appearances,” said the old woman, “what would happen if you faced tigers or wolves?” “Oh, Mama,” replied the old man, “it’s all right if they look ugly, but they are more scary once they open their mouths. I made the remark that they looked like a yakṣa, a horse-face, and a thunder squire, and one of them shouted back, saying that the thunder squire was his grandson, the yakṣa his great-grandson, and the horse-face his great-great grandson. I was quite terrified by what I heard.”

  “No! No!” said the Tang Monk. “The one who looks like a thunder squire happens to be my eldest disciple, Sun Wukong; the one with the horse-face is my second disciple, Zhu Wuneng, and the one who looks like a yakṣa is my third disciple, Sha Wujing. Though they may be ugly, they have embraced the faith of utter poverty and made submission to the virtuous fruit. They are no vicious demons or ferocious fiends. Why fear them?”

  Greatly relieved by what they heard, the old couple said, “Please come in, please come in.” The elder walked out of the door to instruct his disciples, saying, “Just now the old man found you three most repulsive. When you go in now to meet him and his family, don’t offend them. All of you should behave more courteously.” “I’m both handsome and civilized,” said Eight Rules, “and I’m not sassy like elder brother.” “Indeed!” chuckled Pilgrim. “You’re a fine man, if it weren’t for that long snout, those big ears, and that hideous face!” “Stop wrangling,” said Sha Monk. “This isn’t the place for you to be smart-alecks. Let’s go in! Let’s go in!”

  Thereupon they brought the luggage and the horse inside, and after they reached the thatched hall, they made a bow before taking their seats. As she was both good and kind, the old woman took the little boy inside and then asked for rice to be cooked and a vegetarian meal to be prepared for master and disciples. After they ate, it grew dark and lamps were brought into the thatched hall so that the pilgrims could sit and chat. “Patron,” asked the elder, “what is your noble surname?” The elder replied, “My surname is Yang.” When asked about his age, the old man replied that he was seventy-four. “How many sons do you have?” asked Tripitaka again. The old man said, “Only one. Just now, the one following Mama is our little grandson.”

  “I would like to greet your son,” said the elder, “if he’s willing to meet us.” “That fellow,” replied the elder, “is not worthy of your bow. Life is rather cruel to this old moron, because I can’t seem to be able to rear him. He’s no longer staying with us.” “Where is he then,” said Tripitaka, “and what so
rt of profession does he have?” “Pity! Pity!” sighed the old man, shaking his head. “If he had a profession somewhere, that would be lucky for me. Unfortunately he is wicked in thought and has no regard for his origin. All he cares for is to plunder and rob, to kill and burn. His friends are all rascals and ruffians. He went out about five days ago, and he hasn’t been back since.”

  When Tripitaka heard this, he dared not reply, thinking to himself, “Perhaps he’s one of those beaten to death by Wukong . . .” As he grew more anxious, the elder rose from his seat and exclaimed, “My goodness! My goodness! How could such fine parents give birth to such a rebellious son!” Approaching them, Pilgrim said, “Venerable Sir, such a vile and pernicious offspring can only implicate his parents in dire troubles. Why keep him? Let me go find him and slay him for you!” “I would like to send him away, too,” said the old man, “but I have no other heir. Though he lacks talents, I must still leave him behind to dig my grave.” Smiling, both Eight Rules and Sha Monk said, “Elder Brother, you should mind your own business. You and I are not officials. If his family is unwilling, this affair should no longer concern us. Let us ask the patron for a bundle of hay instead so that we may make our bedding somewhere. By morning, we should be on our way.” The old man got up and took Sha Monk to the rear to pick up two bundles of hay. Then they were told to rest in a barn in the rear garden. After Pilgrim led the horse and Eight Rules poled the luggage to the barn, they retired, and we shall leave them for the moment.