怎生留得長遠 How Is It to Be Kept for Long?
小和尚道：「師公差了。唐僧乃是離鄉背井的一個行腳僧。你這等年高享用，也夠了，倒要像他做行腳僧，何也？」老僧道：「我雖是坐家自在，樂乎晚景，卻不得他這袈裟穿穿。若教我穿得一日兒，就死也閉眼，也是我來陽世間為僧一場。」眾僧道：「好沒正經。你要穿他的，有何難處？我們明日留他住一日，你就穿他一日；留他住十日，你就穿他十日；便罷了，何苦這般痛哭？」老僧道：「縱然留他住了年載，也只穿得年載，到底也不得氣長。他要去時，只得與他去，怎生留得長遠？」小和尚道：「师公差了。唐僧乃是离乡背井的一个行脚僧。你这等年高享用，也够了，倒要像他做行脚僧，何也？」老僧道：「我虽是坐家自在，乐乎晚景，却不得他这袈裟穿穿。若教我穿得一日儿，就死也闭眼，也是我来阳世间为僧一场。」众僧道：「好没正经。你要穿他的，有何难处？我们明日留他住一日，你就穿他一日；留他住十日，你就穿他十日；便罢了，何苦这般痛哭？」老僧道：「纵然留他住了年载，也只穿得年载，到底也不得气长。他要去时，只得与他去，怎生留得长远？」
逐句解 Line by line
A young monk said, "Grandfather is mistaken. The Tang monk is one who has left home and native place — a monk who goes on foot.
差了: 差 is chà here, "to be in error" — a third reading again, beside chā (差錯) and chāi (欽差). 離鄉背井, "to leave one's village and turn one's back on the well," is the set phrase for exile; 行腳僧 is the wandering mendicant.
"You, at your great age, have your comforts, and enough of them. Would you rather be like him, and go on foot? What is the sense of it?"
The young monk's argument is unanswerable on its own terms and misses everything. He supposes his master envies the Tang monk's life. What the old man envies is the Tang monk's robe — and, dimly, the thing the robe means, which is that its wearer left home.
The old monk said, "Though I sit at home at my ease, and take my pleasure in the evening of my life, I cannot come by that cassock of his to wear.
坐家自在, "to sit at home at ease" — set against 行腳僧, the monk who walks, in the previous line. 不得 takes dé, the potential.
"If I might wear it a single day, I would shut my eyes in death content; it would mean I had been a monk once, in this world of the living."
穿得 is again the potential dé; the 兒 of 一日兒 is the neutral diminutive, er. 為僧 reads wéi, "to be a monk." This is the passage's terrible sentence: two hundred and seventy years in the Order, and he believes a day in the right coat would make him, at last, a monk.
The monks said, "What nonsense is this? If you want to wear his, where is the difficulty?
好沒正經, "how utterly frivolous" — the monks speak to their patriarch as to a child in a tantrum, and they are not wrong.
"Tomorrow we will keep him a day, and you shall wear it a day;
The proposal is a rising ladder, and its arithmetic is the arithmetic of the whole house: a day, ten days, as many days as one can contrive. Nobody proposes that he ask.
"keep him ten days, and you shall wear it ten. That is all there is to it. Why weep so bitterly?"
便罷了, "and there's an end of it" — 了 is the particle le. 這般 takes bān.
The old monk said, "Even if we kept him a year, I should only wear it a year; in the end it would not last.
年載: 載 is zǎi, a year. 氣長 ("long of breath," lasting) takes cháng. Both instances of 得 are dé.
"When he wishes to go, we can only let him go. How is it to be kept for long?"
只得 and 留得 both dé; 長遠 again cháng. The old man has stated the problem with perfect clarity — a borrowed thing must be given back — and in stating it he has framed the question to which his disciples will supply the answer.
The monks reason with their patriarch and, in reasoning, corrupt him. Their argument is that a want may be satisfied by degrees: wear it a day, wear it ten, and be content. His answer exposes the flaw with a clarity that is almost philosophical — 縱然留他住了年載，也只穿得年載, "even a year would only be a year" — and so drives the conversation, in three exchanges, from a borrowed garment to an unanswerable question about permanence. 怎生留得長遠？ How is it to be kept for good? It is the last thing he says before another monk supplies the only possible answer, which is that the owner must not leave.
Note the phrase the old man reaches for at the height of his longing: 也是我來陽世間為僧一場 — "at least I should have been a monk once, in this world of the living." He is two hundred and seventy years a monk. Wú Chéng'ēn lets him say it without comment, and the sentence hangs over the rest of the chapter. He does not doubt his ordination, his lineage, or his eight hundred robes; he doubts, in the dark, whether any of it ever amounted to being what he was called. The cassock has told him. That is the offence for which he will kill.