十萬八千里 A Hundred and Eight Thousand Lǐ
太宗聞言，稱讚不已。又問：「遠涉西方，端的路程多少？」三藏道：「總記菩薩之言，有十萬八千里之遠。途中未曾記數，只知經過了一十四遍寒暑。太宗闻言，称赞不已。又问：「远涉西方，端的路程多少？」三藏道：「总记菩萨之言，有十万八千里之远。途中未曾记数，只知经过了一十四遍寒暑。
逐句解 Line by line
Taizong heard him out and praised him without stopping.
稱讚不已 — praised him and could not leave off. The emperor has just been told his own gift was handed to a doorkeeper as a bribe, and his response is admiration.
He asked further: “Journeying so far into the west — how long was the road, exactly?”
端的 is the sharp word here and it hides in plain sight. Its second character is the commonest in written Chinese, the little marker that hangs on the end of phrases — but in this pair it is a full word read dì, meaning really, precisely, and the dictionaries name this very phrase when they define it. Early vernacular; it has since dropped out of the language. So the question is not roughly how far. It is: give me the actual figure. And it is the third thing Taizong has asked for and the third that is a number.
Sanzang said: “By what the Bodhisattva said in sum, it is a hundred and eight thousand 里.”
十萬八千里 — a hundred and eight thousand lǐ. It is the figure at the bottom of the ledger Guanyin read last chapter, and it is also, exactly, how far Monkey travels in one somersault. The novel established that in its first seven chapters and has never once put the two facts side by side. It does not here either. 總記菩薩之言 — going by what the Bodhisattva said. He does not claim to have measured it. He is quoting the person who set the errand.
“Along the way we kept no count; we know only that we passed through fourteen rounds of cold and heat.”
未曾記數 — kept no count. The emperor asked for the exact figure and is told nobody was counting. 一十四遍寒暑 — fourteen turns of cold and heat. Not years: winters and summers, the way a farmer reckons. It is the most physical measure of time in the chapter, and it is the only one the pilgrims produce themselves. Everybody else in this chapter counts in days and scrolls. The men who walked it count in weather.
The emperor wants a number, and asks for it with a word that means precisely — no rounding. It is the third question he has asked about the scriptures and the third that is arithmetic.
What he gets is a hundred and eight thousand lǐ, which is the figure at the foot of the ledger of ordeals — and which is also, exactly, the distance Monkey covers in a single somersault. The novel established that in its first seven chapters and has never put the two facts in the same sentence. It does not do so here.
And then the honest answer: nobody was counting. Fourteen rounds of cold and heat is all they have, and it is not a figure at all but a way of saying you were out in the weather for a long time. Everyone else in this chapter counts days and scrolls. The men who walked it count winters.