亂搗巢穴 下山投西 The Pilgrim Batters the Nest, and the Party Goes West
行者聞言，冷笑道：「我們去，不必問他，問我便了。」三藏還不解其意。那禪師化作金光，徑上烏巢而去。長老往上拜謝，行者心中大怒，舉鐵棒望上亂搗，只見蓮花生萬朵，祥霧護千層。行者縱有攪海翻江力，莫想挽著烏巢一縷籐。三藏見了，扯住行者道：「悟空，這樣一個菩薩，你搗他窩巢怎的？」行者道：「他罵了我兄弟兩個一場去了。」三藏道：「他講的西天路徑，何嘗罵你？」行者道：「你那裡曉得？他說『野豬挑擔子』是罵的八戒；『多年老石猴』是罵的老孫。你怎麼解得此意？」八戒道：「師兄息怒。這禪師也曉得過去未來之事，但看他『水怪前頭遇』這句話，不知驗否？饒他去罷。」行者見蓮花祥霧，近那巢邊，只得請師父上馬，下山往西而去。那一去：行者闻言，冷笑道：「我们去，不必问他，问我便了。」三藏还不解其意。那禅师化作金光，径上乌巢而去。长老往上拜谢，行者心中大怒，举铁棒望上乱捣，只见莲花生万朵，祥雾护千层。行者纵有搅海翻江力，莫想挽着乌巢一缕籐。三藏见了，扯住行者道：「悟空，这样一个菩萨，你捣他窝巢怎的？」行者道：「他骂了我兄弟两个一场去了。」三藏道：「他讲的西天路径，何尝骂你？」行者道：「你那里晓得？他说『野猪挑担子』是骂的八戒；『多年老石猴』是骂的老孙。你怎么解得此意？」八戒道：「师兄息怒。这禅师也晓得过去未来之事，但看他『水怪前头遇』这句话，不知验否？饶他去罢。」行者见莲花祥雾，近那巢边，只得请师父上马，下山往西而去。那一去：
畢竟不知前程端的如何，且聽下回分解。毕竟不知前程端的如何，且听下回分解。
逐句解 Line by line
The Pilgrim, hearing this, laughed coldly. "We shall go on. There is no need to ask him. Ask me."
冷笑, a cold laugh: the novel's reliable signal that Wukong is about to do something he will regret. 問我便了 takes 了 as the light particle le, not liǎo — "just ask me and that will be that."
Sanzang did not take his meaning. The Chan Master turned into a golden light and went straight up to his crow's nest.
還不解其意 — Sanzang has understood none of it, and he does not understand it later either. 還 is hái, still.
The elder bowed his thanks towards it; but the Pilgrim's heart swelled with rage, and he raised his iron rod and struck wildly upward.
Master and disciple, in a single sentence, do the two opposite things to the same tree: 往上拜謝, bowing up at it in thanks, and 舉鐵棒望上亂搗, raising an iron rod and jabbing wildly up at it. The novel sets them side by side and says nothing.
Then he saw ten thousand lotus blossoms spring forth, and an auspicious mist that wrapped it in a thousand folds.
A balanced couplet sitting inside the prose without any announcement — no 但見, no 正是, nothing to introduce it. The house convention leaves such unheralded couplets as prose, so this one is not set as verse even though it scans like it.
Though the Pilgrim had strength to churn the seas and overturn the rivers, he could not pull loose one strand of the nest's creeper.
攪海翻江, to churn the seas and overturn the rivers, is the standing measure of Wukong's strength, and here it is being measured against a creeper. 莫想挽著 takes 著 as the result-marker zháo: not that he did not pull, but that pulling achieved nothing.
Seeing it, Sanzang caught hold of him. "Wukong, he is such a Bodhisattva as that. What do you mean by battering his nest?"
這樣一個菩薩 — Sanzang promotes the hermit to Bodhisattva on the evidence of the lotuses, on the spot and without hesitation. He may well be right.
The Pilgrim said: "He cursed the two of us, my brother and me, and went off."
罵了我兄弟兩個一場: cursed the pair of us, a whole round of it. 一場 takes 場 as cháng, the measure word for a bout or an episode — the same word used of the all-night fight at the cave. Wukong has classified the insult as a battle.
Sanzang said: "He was speaking of the road to the Western Heaven. When did he curse you?" The Pilgrim said: "What do you know of it?
何嘗罵你, "when did he ever curse you?" 你那裡曉得 uses the question-word 那, nǎ, and 曉得 takes 得 as de.
By 'a wild boar shoulders the carrying-pole' he was cursing Bajie; by 'an ancient stone ape of many years' he was cursing old Sun. How should you make out his meaning?"
Wukong reads the prophecy back line by line as an indictment, which is a fair reading and a thin-skinned one. 解得此意 takes 得 as dé, the can-do complement: how could you have made it out?
Bajie said: "Brother, let your anger go. This Chan Master knows the affairs of past and future too.
息怒, let your anger rest — the standard phrase for talking somebody down. Bajie, who has just been publicly described as a beast of burden, is the one doing the calming.
Only look to that line of his, 'a water-monster is met with up ahead,' and we shall see whether it proves out or not. Let him be, and let us go."
And here is the shrewdest thing said in the chapter. If the abuse is accurate, then so is the rest of the prophecy, which makes 水怪前頭遇 — a water-monster met with up ahead — a line worth taking seriously rather than resenting. He is right, and the water-monster, when the party reaches him, turns out to be the third disciple.
Seeing the lotuses and the blessed mist about the nest, the Pilgrim could only ask his master to mount, and they went down the mountain and westward. And going, they went —
只得, he had no choice in the matter. 那一去： is the run-up to the closing couplet, the same class of cue as 但見那：, and it closes off the prose.
It will surely make pure blessing scarce among men, and set calamity and demons thick upon the hills.
The closing couplet, delivered as a forecast of the road ahead. 管教, "it will certainly cause," takes 教 as the causative jiào, and 人間少 takes 少 as shǎo, few. It does the work of the usual tag-couplet, but it is not tagged as one: the run-up 那一去： makes it an ordinary block of verse.
In the end we do not know what really lies ahead. Listen to the next chapter, and it will be explained.
The invariable chapter-closing formula, and 端的 takes 的 as dì once again. 且聽下回分解 — wait and hear the next instalment expounded — keeps up the storyteller's fiction that all this is being told aloud, in a room, to people who will come back tomorrow for more.
The chapter ends by proving its own prophecy. 多年老石猴，那裡懷嗔怒 — an old stone ape of many years, there he nurses his spite — and four sentences later the old stone ape is battering a hermit's nest with an iron rod because his feelings have been hurt. The lotuses that spring up in ten thousand blossoms to shield it are the novel's entire judgment on the attempt, and it declines to add a word.
Bajie has the last argument, and it is the best reasoning anybody does in the chapter. If the Chan Master was accurate about the boar and the ape, he is accurate about the rest, and the line worth attending to is 水怪前頭遇 — a water-monster met with up ahead. The Idiot, having just been publicly called a beast of burden, is the one who works out that the insult is evidence. The water-monster is Sha Wujing, and he is waiting for them further along the road.