7
The Buddha’s Bet
In the alchemy laboratory of the Cinnabar Palace, Lord Lao Tzu, Supreme Patriarch of the Way, dumped Monkey into the Crucible of the Eight Trigrams, clamped down the lid, and lifted the crucible onto the hearth.
“Stoke up the fire as high as you can,” he told his assistant. “We’ll need the greatest heat possible to refine this villain.”
Meanwhile, Monkey was starting to come to. “What hit me?” he wondered, rubbing his sore head. “And where in Heaven have they taken me?”
He groped around in the dark. “It’s some kind of porcelain pot, and it’s getting warm! Are they trying to bake me? Or burn me to ashes? Well, I won’t let them do it!”
Monkey pushed and kicked at the lid, but it wouldn’t give. Then he took the miniature staff from his ear, held it pointing up, and said, “Grow!”
In a flash the staff enlarged to five feet, pushing against the bottom of the crucible and shattering the top. As Monkey jumped out, he knocked over the astonished Supreme Patriarch, sending him head over heels.
Monkey ran in a blind rage all the way from the Cinnabar Palace to the Cloud Palace of the Golden Doors, brandishing his staff at every heavenly official along the way. At the palace steps he found the Heavenly General of Mighty Miracle and the twelve Thunder Generals, who all grew pale at the sight of him.
“So you thought you could do away with the Monkey King!” shouted Monkey. “Well, here’s a message for the Jade Emperor: I’m no longer the Protector of Horses. I’m now the Great Sage Equal to Heaven. And he’s no longer the Jade Emperor, because I’m taking over! If he doesn’t step down from the Celestial Throne, I’ll come and pull him off it!”
* * *
In the Hall of Divine Mist, the Jade Emperor could hardly believe the message he had heard from the Heavenly General.
“The audacity of this wretched monkey knows no bounds!” he declared. “Gather as many soldiers as you need and wipe him out!”
“Your Majesty,” said the Heavenly General uneasily, “I fear we are unable to do so. The creature is too powerful a fighter for any single warrior to defeat. And if we send great numbers against him, he can easily outdo us with an army made from the hairs of his body. Even if we capture him again, we have no way to destroy or imprison him.”
“Just what are you telling me?” asked the Jade Emperor in amazement. “That I must give up my throne to this stinking monkey?”
“Your Majesty,” said Kwan Yin, “I don’t think it need come to that. There is still one who could defeat the rebellious Immortal and preserve your rule. Why not send to the Western Paradise and ask the assistance of the Buddha?”
The Jade Emperor said, “If the resources of Heaven are not enough to defeat this monster, I suppose I have no choice!”
Moments later, the Spirit of the Great White Planet Venus was speeding on a magic cloud out the West Gate of Heaven. It was not long before he reached the Western Paradise, where he landed on the Mountain of Miracles and entered the Temple of the Thunderclap.
The Buddha listened closely to the message of the Great White Planet. Then he turned to his disciples. “Remain steadfast in your practice of meditation until my return.”
* * *
Outside the Cloud Palace of the Golden Doors, Monkey marched up and down, swinging his staff, till his patience ran out.
“Time’s up!” he yelled at the quaking Thunder Generals. “I’m coming in!”
But just as he stepped forward, a magic cloud landed in front of him. Off it stepped a huge man in the robe of a monk.
“What’s this?” said Monkey. “Who are you, old monk, and why are you standing in my way?”
The man laughed. “I am Siddhartha, often called the Buddha. I am told you call yourself the Great Sage Equal to Heaven and even demand the Jade Emperor’s place on the Celestial Throne.”
“That’s right,” said Monkey. “He’s been there long enough. Someone else should get a turn.”
“The Jade Emperor,” said the Buddha, “has been perfecting himself through four million lifetimes, for over two hundred million years. And you’re not yet even fully human! What makes you think you’re suited to rule Heaven and Earth?”
“I have great powers,” said Monkey. “I’ve mastered the Seventy-Two Changes. And I can travel for hundreds of miles with a single somersault!”
“Indeed!” said the Buddha. “Then could you stand on the palm of my hand and somersault clear out of it?”
Monkey stared at the Buddha. “Enlightenment must have addled your brain! I just said I can somersault hundreds of miles. How could I not jump out of your palm?”
“Then wager with me,” said the Buddha. “If you get off my palm with a single somersault, the Celestial Throne will be yours. I’ll just tell the Jade Emperor to come live with me in the Western Paradise. But if you don’t make it off my palm, you’ll return to Earth and leave Heaven alone.”
“You can make good on your promise?” asked Monkey.
“Certainly,” said the Buddha.
“Then you’re on!”
Monkey put away his staff and jumped onto the Buddha’s palm, which was the size of a lotus leaf. Then he gave the mightiest leap of his life.
Head over heels Monkey tumbled through the air, spinning like a windmill for hundreds, thousands of miles. At last he came to five olive-colored pillars reaching high into the sky.
“This must be the end of Heaven,” he told himself, and he landed at the base of the middle pillar. “That bet wasn’t hard to win. But I’d better leave behind some proof.”
He plucked a hair from his tail and said, “Change!” The hair turned to a writing brush filled with ink, and Monkey wrote on the pillar,
MONKEY WAS HERE
He returned the hair to his tail, gave another mighty leap, and moments later landed back in the Buddha’s palm.
“All right, old monk,” said Monkey. “Now keep your part of the bargain and tell the Jade Emperor to clear out.”
“You impudent ape!” said the Buddha. “You’ve been on my palm the whole time!”
“What are you talking about?” said Monkey. “I somersaulted clear to the end of Heaven! If you don’t believe me, come see the proof for yourself.”
“There’s no need to go anywhere,” said the Buddha. “Just look down.”
Monkey looked down, and there at the base of the Buddha’s middle finger were the characters,
MONKEY WAS HERE
“It can’t be!” declared Monkey. “It’s some kind of trick! I’m going back to look for myself.”
But before Monkey could leap again, the Buddha turned his hand over, thrust Monkey out the West Gate of Heaven, and pushed him down to Earth. The hand turned into a five-peaked mountain which pinned Monkey between stone walls. His head and arms were out, but the rest of him was hopelessly trapped.
“You can’t do this to me!” cried Monkey. “I’m the Monkey King! I’m an Immortal! I’m the Great Sage Equal to Heaven! Let me out!”
He stopped to consider. Then he added, “Please?”
Epilogue:
To Stone Returned
High above in Heaven, outside the Cloud Palace of the Golden Doors, the Buddha was receiving profuse thanks and congratulations from the Jade Emperor, the Lady Queen Mother, and Lord Lao Tzu. But at last he said, “I must now return to my disciples in the Western Paradise.”
He turned to Kwan Yin, Most Compassionate Bodhisattva and Goddess of Mercy. “Would you care to accompany me?”
As the two flew west on magic clouds, Kwan Yin said gently, “No doubt the rebellious Immortal deserved a strict punishment. But wasn’t eternal imprisonment a bit harsh?”
“His punishment is not eternal,” replied the Buddha. “You may remember I once told you about this very monkey. He is destined to become an enlightened one, a Buddha.”
“And how will that come about?” asked Kwan Yin.
“Five hundred years from now,” said the Buddha, “I
will need a messenger from the Middle Kingdom to come to the Western Paradise and carry back holy scriptures. It will be your own role to find a man or woman worthy of the task. At that time, too, you will recruit our penitent monkey friend to protect the messenger on the long and perilous journey. By doing so, the monkey will atone for his crimes and earn Enlightenment.”
“The compassion of the Buddha is beyond measure,” said Kwan Yin.
Buddha and Bodhisattva smiled at one another and touched hands lightly. Far ahead, the Temple of the Thunderclap gleamed in the setting sun.
About the Story
Monkey is the most popular figure in all Chinese literature, loved for centuries by young people and adults alike. His story is found in a classic sixteenth-century novel, The Journey to the West (Xi You Ji or Hsi Yu Chi), as well as in countless later adaptations, from Chinese opera to comic books.
The novel, written anonymously but often attributed to the humorist Wu Cheng’en, is an epic comic fantasy of 100 chapters. My retelling covers only the first seven chapters, which form a kind of prelude. The bulk of the novel recounts the journey of the Buddhist monk Sanzang to collect sacred scriptures from Buddha in the Western Paradise, aided by Monkey and several other magical creatures.
Monkey’s adventures provide a breathtaking, whirlwind tour of Chinese mythology, with its rich amalgam of Buddhist and Taoist elements. Here are notes on some of these.
Jade Emperor, Heaven. Though the Jade Emperor is ruler of Heaven and Earth, he is not so much a supreme God as a supreme administrator. In fact, he is outranked by the three top divine beings of the Chinese pantheon, Buddha, Lao Tzu, and Confucius—who are themselves subject to higher universal forces.
The Chinese Heaven is modeled closely on the government of the Chinese emperors. In other words, it is a bloated bureaucracy, crammed with innumerable officials with pompous titles, with a finger in every possible earthly activity.
Lao Tzu, Immortals, Patriarch Subodhi. Centuries before Taoism was established as an organized religion, it existed as a spiritual discipline similar to the yoga systems of India. (Tao is pronounced “DOW,” rhyming with “cow.”) The followers of this branch of Taoism, represented in the story by the Patriarch Subodhi and his disciples, were ascetics living in mountain hermitages. These ascetics aimed to become “Immortals” by developing conscious spirit bodies that could transcend death. But for most Chinese, this was simplified into the belief that Taoist masters achieved physical immortality.
The founder of Taoism is said to be Lao Tzu, who became known as a divine being. He is thought to have lived around the 5th or 6th century B.C., though we cannot be sure he actually lived at all. He is also supposed to have written the Tao Te Ching (“Book of the Way”), the primary text of Taoism and the most famous of all Chinese classics.
In Taoist literature, secrets of spiritual discipline were often coded in the metaphorical language of alchemy. Most Chinese, though, took this language literally. And so Lao Tzu and other Taoist figures were thought of as master alchemists, producing “Elixir of Life” and “pills of immortality.” Cinnabar, or mercuric sulfide—which I’ve used for the name of Lao Tzu’s palace—was a prime ingredient in such “alchemy.”
Buddha, Bodhisattva, Western Paradise. Buddha, or the Buddha, is the title given to Siddhartha Gautama, founder of Buddhism, now revered as a divine being. He lived in India from around 563 to around 483 B.C.
The title means “Enlightened One” or “Awakened One.” As such, it is often applied by Buddhists not only to Siddhartha but to all who attain his state of mind—a state that is said to bring a perception of the true nature of reality and a release from the need for additional lives. Bodhisattva is a related title for one who has become enlightened but remains on earth to help others toward that goal.
The Western Paradise is where good Buddhists are taken after death—a congenial place where they can progress more rapidly toward becoming Buddhas themselves. This is the teaching of the “Pure Land” school of Buddhism, which predominates in East Asia. In The Journey to the West, the Western Paradise is also the present home of the Buddha and seems to be somewhere in India.
Kwan Yin (or Kuan Yin, or Guan Yin). The Bodhisattva Kwan Yin, commonly called the Goddess of Mercy, is China’s favorite divine being—much more widely loved and worshiped than the Buddha, Lao Tzu, Confucius, the Jade Emperor, or any other. Her name means “heeding the cry.” She hears and helps all those who cry out to her in need, and also delivers babies to their mothers.
Dragon King of the Eastern Sea. In Chinese mythology, dragons are in most cases benevolent. They live underwater and are found in every good-sized lake and river. They can also fly, as they do while performing their main job, which is to bring rain.
There are four dragon kings, headed by the one in the Eastern Sea. Their magnificent palaces and treasure hordes are legendary.
Yama, Judges of the Dead, Land of Darkness. The Land of Darkness is the Chinese Hell. It is not underground but in a kind of parallel dimension. When people reach their fixed times of death, demon officials arrest their spirits and bring them before Lord Yama, the First Judge of the Dead. If their good deeds balance or outweigh their evil ones, they are sent directly to the Tenth Judge for rebirth. Otherwise, they must first pass before the other judges for punishment of various kinds of wrongdoing.
Especially good spirits might be brought to the Land of Darkness only briefly or not at all. They might be sent to Heaven to receive official posts, or to the Buddhist Western Paradise, or to Mount Kunlun, home of the Taoist Immortals.
Lady Queen Mother. In The Journey to the West, the Lady Queen Mother is the wife of the Jade Emperor and lives in Heaven. Elsewhere she is often known as the Queen Mother of the West, ruler of Mount Kunlun, home of the Taoist Immortals. In either case, she tends the orchard where the Immortal Peaches grow.
My retelling simplifies and shortens Monkey’s tale but broadly follows the original story line. Here are the translations I consulted:
Monkey, by Wu Ch’êng-ên, translated by Arthur Waley, John Day, New York, 1943; reprinted by Grove, New York, 1958. Abridged.
The Journey to the West, translated and edited by Anthony C. Yu, University of Chicago, Chicago and London, 1977. Four volumes.
Journey to the West, by Wu Cheng’en, translated by W. J. F. Jenner, Foreign Languages Press, Beijing, 1982. Three volumes.
For more about the story, a more detailed reading list, a reader’s theater script, a deleted scene, and other special features, please visit my Web site at www.aaronshep.com.
Aaron Shepard
Aaron Shepard is the award-winning author of many children’s books from publishers large and small. His stories have also appeared often in Cricket and in Australia’s School Magazine. Visit him at
www.aaronshep.com
The Monkey King: A Superhero Tale of China, Retold from The Journey to the West (Ancient Fantasy) Page 3
