金蟬轉世 The Golden Cicada Reborn: Xuanzang's Origins
次日三位朝臣，聚眾僧，在那山川壇裡，逐一從頭查選，內中選得一名有德行的高僧。你道他是誰人？次日三位朝臣，聚众僧，在那山川坛里，逐一从头查选，内中选得一名有德行的高僧。你道他是谁人？
逐句解 Line by line
The next day the three court ministers gathered the assembled monks in the Altar of Mountains and Streams, and reviewed them one by one from the beginning, choosing out from among them a single eminent monk of true virtue and conduct.
The 山川壇, the Altar of Mountains and Streams, is an altar of the state cult to the spirits of the land, here doing duty as the hall where a Buddhist officiant is chosen. 那 in 那山川壇 is the pointing nà; 得 in 選得, to select and so obtain, is the outcome de.
And who, do you ask, was he?
你道他是誰人 — and who do you suppose he was? The storyteller turns and speaks straight at his audience, and the question is the hinge that swings the origin verse into place.
Numinous and penetrating, his true name was the Golden Cicada; only because, careless of heart, he let slip the Buddha's lecture,
金蟬, the Golden Cicada, is Xuanzang in an earlier life: a disciple of the Buddha sent down to mortal rebirth for letting his attention wander during a sermon. The cause is worth pausing over, because the whole journey west begins with somebody not listening in class. This verse is the chapter's mythological anchor, and in the 世德堂 recension it is the principal place where Xuanzang's origins are given at all, the long Chen Guangrui prose narrative being absent from the main sequence, as flagged at Chapter 9. 為 in 只為, only because, is wèi.
he was cast into the dusty mortal world to suffer its grinding, and born into the common age to meet its snares and nets.
轉托塵凡, cast into the world of dust, and 遭羅網, to run into snares and nets, describe the fall into saṃsāra, the round of birth and death. 降 in 降生, to be born, to come down into life, is jiàng.
Falling to earth in the womb, he met with violence at once; before ever he was born, he faced a wicked band.
Two lines to carry a whole melodrama: the father murdered and the mother seized before the child is so much as born.
His father was Chen, the Top Graduate of Haizhou; his mother's father, a Commander, was a chief of the reigning court.
陳狀元 is Chen Guangrui, who placed first in the palace examination — the 狀元, top of the entire empire in his year. The grandfather on the mother's side is Yin Kaishan, a 總管 or Area Commander. 朝 in 當朝 is cháo; 長 in 當朝長, chief of the reigning court, is zhǎng.
At birth his fate fell under the star of the drowned river; on the current, amid the waves, he drifted in the swelling flood.
落江星, the star of falling into the river, is the ill-omened horoscope the infant is born under, and the reason he is set adrift on the water. It is also where his childhood name comes from: Jiangliu, River Current.
On the island of Gold Mountain lay a great affinity; the monk Qian'an took him in and reared him.
金山 is the island monastery of Gold Mountain, where the abandoned baby was found and reared. A real divergence of texts sits in this line: the 世德堂 names the monk 遷安, Qian'an, where the more familiar tradition calls him Faming. 將 in 將他養 is the disposal jiāng.
When just eighteen he knew his own mother again, and hastened to the capital to seek his mother's elder kin.
都 in 京都, the capital, is dū; 長 in 外長, the senior kinsman on the mother's side, is zhǎng.
The Commander Kaishan mustered a great army, and at Hongzhou put down the brigands and slew the wicked band.
開山 is Yin Kaishan, avenging his son-in-law by taking an army against the bandit who murdered him. 調 in 調大軍, to muster troops, is diào.
The Top Graduate Guangrui escaped the net of heaven; father and son met once more, a thing to be praised and prized.
光蕊 is Chen Guangrui, restored to life by a miracle. 子 in 子父, son and father, is the noun zǐ; 相 in 相逢, to meet one another, is xiāng.
Once more he paid court to the reigning sovereign and received his grace; on the Lingyan Tower his worthy name resounded.
The 凌煙閣, the Lingyan Pavilion, is where the Tang hung portraits of its most deserving officials — the dynasty's hall of fame. To have one's name sound there is the measure of Chen Guangrui's restored honour.
The office of favor he would not take, wishing to become a monk; at Hongfu Temple, a śramaṇa, he went seeking the Way.
He turns down the office and takes orders instead. 為 in 願為僧, wished to become a monk, is wéi; 將 in 將道訪 is the disposal jiāng; 沙門 (shā mén) is a Buddhist ascetic.
His childhood name was Jiangliu, the ancient Buddha's child; his dharma-name was called Chen Xuanzang.
And the couplet names him at last. 古佛兒, the ancient Buddha's child, carries the little suffix 兒, read er; 奘 in 玄奘 is read zàng.
The origin verse is the mythological keystone of the whole novel, and the chapter sets it down here with deliberate weight. In twelve tight couplets it establishes Xuanzang's double identity — the Golden Cicada, a disciple of the Buddha cast down to mortal rebirth for a lapse of attention — and then races through the melodrama of his earthly beginnings: the murdered father, the seized mother, the infant set adrift on the river, the rescue at Gold Mountain, the revenge and the reunion, and at last the young man refusing office for the monastic Way.
In the 世德堂 recension this compressed verse is effectively the only place the Chen Guangrui and Jiangliu story gets told, the long prose interpolation of that tale being absent from the main sequence, as noted at Chapter 9. To read these couplets is therefore to receive, in shorthand, the entire back-story of the pilgrim on whom the rest of the book depends.