山神現形 The Old Man Vanishes
正打問訊，卻早不見了那老兒。及回看那里社祠，是一片光地。只聽得半空中有人言語道：「聖僧，多簡慢你。我是落伽山山神、土地，蒙菩薩差送鞍轡與汝等的。汝等可努力西行，卻莫一時怠慢。」慌得個三藏滾鞍下馬，望空禮拜道：「弟子肉眼凡胎，不識尊神尊面，望乞恕罪。煩轉達菩薩，深蒙恩佑。」你看他只管朝天磕頭，也不計其數。路傍邊活活的笑倒個孫大聖，孜孜的喜壞個美猴王，上前來扯住唐僧道：「師父，你起來罷，他已去得遠了，聽不見你禱祝，看不見你磕頭，只管拜怎的？」長老道：「徒弟呀，我這等磕頭，你也就不拜他一拜，且立在傍邊，只管哂笑，是何道理？」行者道：「你那裡知道，像他這個藏頭露尾的，本該打他一頓；只為看菩薩面上，饒他打，儘夠了，他還敢受我老孫之拜？老孫自小兒做好漢，不曉得拜人，就是見了玉皇大帝、太上老君，我也只是唱個喏便罷了。」三藏道：「不當人子，莫說這空頭話。快起來，莫誤了走路。」那師父才起來收拾，投西而去。正打问讯，却早不见了那老儿。及回看那里社祠，是一片光地。只听得半空中有人言语道：「圣僧，多简慢你。我是落伽山山神、土地，蒙菩萨差送鞍辔与汝等的。汝等可努力西行，却莫一时怠慢。」慌得个三藏滚鞍下马，望空礼拜道：「弟子肉眼凡胎，不识尊神尊面，望乞恕罪。烦转达菩萨，深蒙恩佑。」你看他只管朝天磕头，也不计其数。路傍边活活的笑倒个孙大圣，孜孜的喜坏个美猴王，上前来扯住唐僧道：「师父，你起来罢，他已去得远了，听不见你祷祝，看不见你磕头，只管拜怎的？」长老道：「徒弟呀，我这等磕头，你也就不拜他一拜，且立在傍边，只管哂笑，是何道理？」行者道：「你那里知道，像他这个藏头露尾的，本该打他一顿；只为看菩萨面上，饶他打，尽够了，他还敢受我老孙之拜？老孙自小儿做好汉，不晓得拜人，就是见了玉皇大帝、太上老君，我也只是唱个喏便罢了。」三藏道：「不当人子，莫说这空头话。快起来，莫误了走路。」那师父才起来收拾，投西而去。
逐句解 Line by line
But even as he was making his salutation, the old man was suddenly not to be seen; and turning to look back at the Shrine of Village and Soil, they found only a stretch of naked ground.
打問訊 is to make the Buddhist greeting with joined hands — Sanzang is literally in mid-bow. 一片光地 is a stretch of bare earth. The shrine, the acolyte, the tea, the supper, the lamps, the bedding: none of it was ever there.
They heard only a voice speaking in mid-air: "Holy monk, I have used you with much neglect.
只聽得 takes the unstressed de. 簡慢 is to be remiss in courtesy — an apology for having entertained a guest poorly, offered by a god who has just given away everything he pretended to own.
I am the Mountain God and the Local God of Mount Potalaka, dispatched by the Bodhisattva to bring the saddle and bridle to you.
落伽山 is Potalaka, with 伽 read qié; 差 is read chāi, dispatched. So not the local gods of Coiled-Snake Mountain at all, but Guanyin's own, sent from her island — which means the poverty, the fire, the bereavement and the beggar's post were a story she composed.
Press on westward with all your strength, and be not slothful for a moment."
努力西行 is to strive westward; 怠慢 is to slacken, to be remiss. The parting charge repeats, almost word for word, what Guanyin said to Wukong when she refused to let him quit.
Startled clean out of himself, Sanzang tumbled from the saddle and bowed toward the empty sky, saying: "Your disciple has the fleshly eyes of a mortal womb and did not know your honoured face. I beg forgiveness for my fault.
慌得 takes the unstressed de; 滾鞍下馬 is to tumble straight out of the saddle. 肉眼凡胎, "fleshly eyes, a common womb", is the standing confession of mortal blindness — and it is still in use in Chinese for somebody who cannot see what is right in front of them. Within a single chapter Sanzang has now failed to recognise a Bodhisattva, a water-god and two mountain deities.
I pray you convey my thanks to the Bodhisattva, whose grace and protection I have deeply received." And look at him: he did nothing but knock his head toward heaven, past all counting.
And there it is: 深蒙恩佑 uses 佑, the very character of the chapter's title-half 諸神暗佑, "the gods give secret protection". He is thanking them for exactly the thing the chapter is named after, and he has no idea he is quoting it. 朝天磕頭, with 朝 read cháo, is to knock the head toward heaven; 不計其數 is "past all counting".
At the roadside the Great Sage Sun fell over laughing, laughing till he was helpless; the Handsome Monkey King was fairly undone with glee.
活活的笑倒 is to fall down alive with laughter; 孜孜的喜壞 is to be spoiled, ruined, wrecked with glee. Both adverbs double a syllable and neither will go into English without loss. Between them they describe helpless, shaking, thoroughly unseemly mirth, aimed at a man on his knees in the road.
He came forward and took hold of the Tang monk, saying: "Master, get up. He has gone far off already;
扯住 is to seize hold of — the same verb with which he grabbed Guanyin's robe and refused to let her go. 去得遠了 takes the unstressed de.
he cannot hear your prayers, he cannot see you knocking your head. What are you going on bowing for?"
禱祝 is to pray; 只管拜怎的 is "what do you mean by going on bowing?" The objection is briskly practical, and it is also the chapter's deepest joke about protection given from out of sight. If nobody can see you being grateful, what exactly is the gratitude for?
Said the elder: "Disciple! When I kowtow like this, you will not bow him so much as a single bow,
不拜他一拜 is "will not bow him so much as one bow". The reproach is a father's, and entirely just.
but stand off at the side doing nothing but smirk. What sort of behaviour is that?"
立在傍邊, with 傍 read páng, is standing off to one side; 哂笑 is to smile in derision. For once Sanzang's indignation cannot be answered, and it is not answered.
Said the Pilgrim: "How should you know? A creature like that, who hides his head and shows his tail, ought by rights to have had a beating;
那裡知道 is the rhetorical question, nǎ. 藏頭露尾 takes 藏 as cáng, to hide — one of only two places in this whole chapter where the character is not the zàng of the monk's own name, the other being 冬藏 at the shrine. The idiom means "hides the head and shows the tail", and it is still exactly what Chinese says about somebody being shifty. Wukong's grievance is not that a god helped them. It is that the god came in disguise.
and only for the Bodhisattva's sake was he let off the beating, which is quite enough for him. Should he dare receive a bow from old Sun besides?
只為 takes 為 as wèi, "only because"; 儘夠了 is "quite enough for him"; 他還敢 takes 還 as hái, "should he yet dare". Reverence, in Wukong's accounting, is a coin he does not mint.
Old Sun has been a stout fellow since he was small, and never learned how to bow to anybody.
好漢 is a stout fellow, a man of mettle — the word of bandit chiefs and sworn brothers; 不曉得拜人 takes the unstressed de, "never learned how to bow to anybody".
Even when I met the Jade Emperor and the Most High Lord Lao, I made them no more than a chanted salute, and there was an end of it."
唱個喏, with 喏 read rě, is to make a small bow with a murmured word — about the slightest courtesy the language has a name for. 太上老君 is Laozi deified, in whose furnace Wukong's fiery eyes were tempered. He names the two highest beings of the Daoist heaven for one reason only: to establish how little he bows.
Said Sanzang: "Irreverent creature! Say no more of such empty stuff. Up now, and do not delay us on the road."
不當人子 bù dāng rén zǐ is literally "unbecoming a man's son", and it is not an insult thrown at the disciple but an exclamation of scandalised piety at what he has just said — the nearest English is "God forbid" or "that is blasphemy". Wukong has just explained that he does not bow to the Jade Emperor either. 空頭話 is empty talk, brag. The monk has no argument left, only shock; and shock turns out to be enough to end the conversation.
Only then did the master rise, gather their things, and set off westward.
才起來 is "only then rose". Sanzang has the last word and Wukong has his way, which is how these two will travel for the next eighty-five chapters.
The revelation arrives in a single clause — the old man gone, the shrine a patch of bare earth — and it rewrites everything behind it. The temple-keeper who lost his family and his house to fire, who lived on his neighbours' alms and kept one good saddle back through all of it because he could not bring himself to sell it, and who gave it away to a stranger on the reasoning that a Bodhisattva had set the example: he was the Mountain God and Local God of Potalaka, sent by Guanyin, and his poverty was an invention.
A reader is entitled to feel slightly cheated, and the novel knows it. Wukong feels it too, and puts the objection in four characters: 藏頭露尾, "hiding his head and showing his tail". Yet nothing that was given was not given. The saddle is real, it fits, and the road west runs on.
And here the chapter title gathers itself up. Sanzang, face down in the dirt, knocking his head at an empty sky, thanks the departed god for 恩佑 — using the very character of 諸神暗佑, "the gods give secret protection". That is what such protection is: something only ever recognised afterwards, by a man with 肉眼凡胎, the fleshly eyes of a mortal womb, bowing to a place where somebody used to be.
Wukong's refusal to bow is not impiety so much as its mirror image. He saw through the disguise, resents having been played, and would rather beat a god than salute one. The two available responses to hidden grace — the prostration and the belly-laugh — are set side by side at the roadside, and the novel corrects neither. Then the master gets up, and they go on westward.