誤認樵夫 The Woodcutter Mistaken for an Immortal
美猴王聽得此言，滿心歡喜道：「神仙原來藏在這裡！」即忙跳入裡面，仔細再看，乃是一個樵子，在那裡舉斧砍柴。但看他打扮非常：美猴王听得此言，满心欢喜道：「神仙原来藏在这里！」即忙跳入里面，仔细再看，乃是一个樵子，在那里举斧砍柴。但看他打扮非常：
猴王近前叫道：「老神仙，弟子起手。」那樵漢慌忙丟了斧，轉身答禮道：「不當人，不當人。我拙漢衣食不全，怎敢當『神仙』二字？」猴王道：「你不是神仙，如何說出神仙的話來？」樵夫道：「我說甚麼神仙話？」猴王道：「我才來至林邊，只聽的你說：『相逢處，非仙即道，靜坐講《黃庭》。』《黃庭》乃道德真言，非神仙而何？」樵夫笑道：「實不瞞你說，這個詞名做《滿庭芳》，乃一神仙教我的。那神仙與我舍下相鄰，他見我家事勞苦，日常煩惱，教我遇煩惱時，即把這詞兒念念，一則散心，二則解困。我才有些不足處思慮，故此念念，不期被你聽了。」猴王近前叫道：「老神仙，弟子起手。」那樵汉慌忙丢了斧，转身答礼道：「不当人，不当人。我拙汉衣食不全，怎敢当『神仙』二字？」猴王道：「你不是神仙，如何说出神仙的话来？」樵夫道：「我说甚么神仙话？」猴王道：「我才来至林边，只听的你说：『相逢处，非仙即道，静坐讲《黄庭》。』《黄庭》乃道德真言，非神仙而何？」樵夫笑道：「实不瞒你说，这个词名做《满庭芳》，乃一神仙教我的。那神仙与我舍下相邻，他见我家事劳苦，日常烦恼，教我遇烦恼时，即把这词儿念念，一则散心，二则解困。我才有些不足处思虑，故此念念，不期被你听了。」
逐句解 Line by line
When the Handsome Monkey King heard this, his heart filled with joy. 'So an immortal has been hiding here all along!' he cried.
神仙原來藏在這裡 ('so an immortal has been hiding here all along'; 藏 cáng, to hide). The monkey leaps to the natural — and wrong — conclusion: a song full of Daoist talk must come from a Daoist adept.
He sprang inside at once and, looking closely, saw that it was a woodcutter, swinging his axe to cut firewood.
樵子 (qiáo zi, a woodcutter; 子 the neutral suffix) 舉斧砍柴 ('raising his axe to cut firewood'; 砍 kǎn) — the reality is humbler than the monkey hoped.
Just look at how he was turned out:
但看他打扮非常 ('just look how strikingly he was turned out'; 打扮 dǎ bàn, one's get-up) is the storyteller's cue for the descriptive 賦 of the woodcutter's homespun clothes.
On his head he wore a bamboo rain-hat, the sheath freshly shed by a new bamboo shoot.
The clothing-賦 works a single conceit: each humble garment is traced back to its raw natural source. The 箬笠 (ruò lì, a broad bamboo-leaf rain-hat) is 'the sheath freshly shed by a new bamboo shoot' (籜 tuò, the sheath of a bamboo culm).
On his body he wore a cloth coat, the gauze spun out of cotton thread.
The cloth coat is 'gauze spun from cotton' (木綿 cotton, 撚 niǎn, to twist into thread, 紗 a light-woven cloth).
At his waist was tied a looped sash, the silk spat from the mouth of an old silkworm.
The looped sash (環絛, 絛 tāo, a woven cord) is 'silk spat from an old silkworm's mouth' — the 維基文庫 reads 口吐之絲 ('spat out as silk'), against 口吞 ('swallowed') in some editions.
On his feet he trod straw sandals, woven from dried sedge.
The straw sandals (草履, the 維基文庫 reading, against 屮履 elsewhere) are 'fashioned from dried sedge' (莎 suō, sedge grass; 槎 chá, to hew or work into shape). The line ends with 爽 (shuǎng) where the parallel calls for a material-noun like 籜/紗/絲 above; both the 維基文庫 and 識典古籍 texts transmit 爽, an unusual reading preserved here rather than emended.
In his hand he held a pure-steel axe; over his shoulder, a coil of hemp rope.
衠鋼斧 ('a pure-steel axe'; 衠 zhūn, an old word for 'genuine, unalloyed'). In 擔挽火麻繩 ('shouldering a coil of hemp rope'), 擔 is the verb dān (1st tone, 'to carry on the shoulder') — distinct from the noun dàn ('a load') in the woodcutter's own song, 收來成一擔.
At pulling down pines and splitting dead trees — who could match this woodcutter?
扳松劈枯樹 ('pulling down pines, splitting dead trees'; 扳 bān, 劈 pī). 爭似此樵能 — 'how could any match this woodcutter's skill?' (爭 here = 怎, 'how'; 似 sì, 'to compare with'). The 賦 ends in admiration of the very ordinariness it has catalogued.
The Monkey King came up close and called out: 'Venerable immortal, your disciple salutes you!'
弟子起手 — 'your disciple raises his hands [in greeting]' (起手, a gesture of salutation; 子 here the full-tone zǐ of 弟子). The monkey addresses the woodcutter as 老神仙, already treating him as the master he seeks.
The woodcutter hastily dropped his axe, turned, and returned the courtesy: 'I don't deserve that, I don't deserve that!
不當人，不當人 is a set phrase of humble protest — roughly 'I'm not worthy, I'm not worthy' (當 dāng, 'to deserve, to bear [a title]'). The woodcutter is embarrassed to be mistaken for an immortal.
I'm a clumsy fellow who can't even feed and clothe himself — how should I dare bear the two words 'immortal'?'
拙漢 ('a clumsy fellow,' self-deprecating; 拙 zhuō). 衣食不全 ('lacking even food and clothing') — he disclaims the title 神仙 on the grounds of mere poverty.
The Monkey King said: 'If you're no immortal, how is it you speak an immortal's words?'
如何說出神仙的話來 — 'how is it you speak an immortal's words?' The monkey reasons backward from the song to the singer; 不是 takes the 不 in its bú sandhi before the falling tone of 是.
The woodcutter said: 'What immortal's words did I speak?'
The woodcutter's puzzled 我說甚麼神仙話 ('what immortal's words did I say?') shows he attaches no special meaning to a song he recites by rote.
The Monkey King said: 'When I came just now to the edge of the wood, I heard you sing:
我才來至林邊 ('I just came to the edge of the wood'; 才 cái, 'just now'). 只聽的 ('only heard,' where 的 stands for 得).
'Wherever I meet a man, if not an immortal then a Daoist, sitting in stillness expounding the Yellow Court.'
The monkey quotes back the song's closing line — 相逢處，非仙即道，靜坐講《黃庭》 — as his proof. To him, anyone who 'sits expounding the Yellow Court' must be an adept.
The Yellow Court is the true word of the Dao and its power — if you're no immortal, then what are you?'
《黃庭》乃道德真言 — 'the Yellow Court is the true word of the Way and its power.' The Huangting jing is a core Daoist meditation scripture; the monkey takes its mention as conclusive. 非神仙而何 ('if not an immortal, then what?').
The woodcutter laughed: 'I'll not deceive you — this lyric is called Mǎn tíng fāng, and an immortal taught it to me.
實不瞞你說 ('I'll be honest with you'; 瞞 mán, to conceal). The woodcutter names the piece: it is a 詞 (cí, a lyric set to a fixed tune) titled 滿庭芳 ('Fragrance Filling the Courtyard') — and, crucially, not his own composition.
That immortal's home neighbours mine.
乃一神仙教我的 — 'an immortal taught it to me' (教 here jiāo, 'to teach,' in contrast to the jiào, 'to cause/order,' of earlier passages). 舍下相鄰 ('neighbours my house'; 舍 shè, a dwelling) — the real immortal lives close by.
Seeing how my household labours and how I'm troubled day to day, he taught me that when vexation comes I should just recite this lyric —
The immortal, seeing the woodcutter's hard 家事 ('household toil') and daily cares, taught him to recite the lyric whenever 煩惱 ('vexation') struck — a charm against worry, nothing more arcane (教 again jiāo, 'to teach').
first, to ease the mind; second, to dispel care. I'd been fretting a little over my hardships, and so I was reciting it — I never expected you to overhear.'
一則散心，二則解困 ('first to ease the mind, second to dispel weariness'). The woodcutter recites it only to soothe himself; 不期被你聽了 ('I never expected you'd overhear it'; 不期, 'unexpectedly,' 被 the passive marker). The misunderstanding is laid bare — yet it will lead the monkey exactly where he needs to go.
The passage turns on a comic deflation. Hearing the Huangting jing named in the song, the Handsome Monkey King bursts into the wood certain he has found his immortal — and finds instead a woodcutter swinging an axe. Wú Chéng'ēn (吳承恩) lingers on the man with a loving clothing-賦 whose every line traces a humble garment back to its plain natural source: the rain-hat to a bamboo shoot's cast sheath, the coat to spun cotton, the sash to a silkworm's thread, the sandals to dried sedge. The cumulative effect is to insist on the woodcutter's utter ordinariness — this is no disguised transcendent, but exactly what he appears to be, a poor man who works with his hands.
The dialogue that follows is gently funny: the woodcutter, taken for an immortal, protests that he cannot even feed and clothe himself, while the monkey reasons stubbornly from the song back to the singer — surely one who 'sits expounding the Yellow Court' must be an adept. The truth is humbler and more interesting. The 滿庭芳 is not the woodcutter's own; an immortal neighbour taught it to him as a charm against 煩惱 ('vexation'), to be recited when his hard life weighs on him. The song that sounded like a sage's testament is, for the man who sings it, a working remedy for worry — though its picture of contented poverty does in fact describe his life.
For all the comedy, the encounter is the hinge on which the monkey's whole career turns. The woodcutter is the unlikely guide — humble, earthbound, filial — who stands at the very threshold of the master's mountain. That the immortal lives 'next door' to a woodcutter is itself meaningful: in this novel the transcendent is not walled off in some remote heaven but tucked into the ordinary world, reachable by anyone pointed the right way. As the next passage shows, it is precisely this poor singer of a borrowed song who will name 靈臺方寸山 and the 斜月三星洞 and send the monkey to Patriarch Subodhi. Andrew H. Plaks reads such moments as the novel's quiet insistence that awakening begins with a turn one is shown, not one one finds alone.