By now three years had slipped by. The Patriarch again ascended his jeweled seat and expounded the Dharma to the assembly.

卻早 is "by now, already" — three more years gone in four characters, the same trick the chapter used on its opening seven. 復登寶座, he mounts the jewelled seat again; 說法 is to expound the Dharma.

What he discoursed on were the kōan-cases and figurative sayings; what he treated of were the outer forms and surface wrappings.

A parallel couplet on the master's range. 公案 (gōng àn) are kōan-cases, the Chan teaching-anecdotes — the word means "public case," as in a magistrate's docket, because a kōan is a case put to the student for judgement. 比語 are figurative sayings. Set against those, 外像包皮, outer images and surface wrappings — the exoteric forms. Inner cases and outer wrappings, both together.

Suddenly he asked: "Where is Wukong?"

忽問, he asks suddenly; 何在 is "where is?"

Wukong came forward and knelt: "Your disciple is here."

弟子有 — "your disciple is present," with 有 doing the work of "here." 弟子 keeps 子 in full tone.

The Patriarch said: "What sort of Way have you been cultivating all this while?"

一向 (yí xiàng) is "all this while, of late," the 一 rising before the falling tone of 向. The master knows perfectly well what his disciple has been cultivating. He is asking for a progress report in front of the class.

Wukong said: "Of late your disciple has grown fairly penetrating in dharma-nature, and his root and source too have gradually grown firm."

The answer is calibrated with some care — enough to be truthful, not enough to give the secret away in public. 法性 (fǎ xìng) is dharma-nature, the fundamental nature of things; 頗 is pǒ, fairly, quite; 漸 is gradually; 矣 marks a state arrived at.

The Patriarch said: "Since you have penetrated dharma-nature and grasped the root and source, and have already settled it into your spirit-body — there yet remains one thing to guard against: the peril of the Three Calamities."

會得 is to grasp, with 得 as de; 已注神體 is that it has already been infused into the spirit-body (注 zhù, to fix, to pour in). Then the turn: 卻只是, "except that…" — and out comes the thing nobody mentioned during the sales pitch. 著 is the durative zhe, and 三災利害 is the peril of the Three Calamities, 利害 meaning severity or danger.

Hearing this, Wukong pondered a long while, then said: "The master's words must be mistaken. I have heard that when the Way is lofty and virtue eminent one is equal to Heaven in years; that when water and fire are in accord the hundred ailments do not arise — how then could there be any 'peril of the Three Calamities'?"

沉吟良久 — he mutters over it a long while before answering, which is new for him. Then he argues, quoting doctrine back at his teacher: a lofty Way and eminent virtue mean years equal to Heaven's, and 水火既濟, water and fire in accord, means the hundred ailments never arise. That phrase is also the name of hexagram 63 of the 《易經》, 既濟, "Already Fording" — the one hexagram in which every line sits in its proper place. 謬 is miù, mistaken; 嘗 is cháng, "once, ever." (百病不生 keeps bù.)

The Patriarch said: "This is no ordinary Way: it wrests away the creative power of Heaven and Earth, it usurps the hidden workings of sun and moon; and once the elixir is formed, neither ghosts nor spirits can abide it.

And here is the answer, bleaker than anything else in the chapter. This is a 非常之道, an out-of-the-ordinary Way, and what it does is 奪天地之造化, wrest away the creative power of Heaven and Earth, and 侵日月之玄機, trespass on the hidden workings of sun and moon (侵 qīn, to encroach). Once the elixir is formed, 鬼神難容 — gods and ghosts cannot abide it. Immortality is not a reward in this system. It is theft, and the universe notices.

Though it halts your aging and lengthens your years, yet when five hundred years have passed, Heaven sends down a thunder-calamity to strike you, and you must see your nature and illumine your mind to dodge it in advance.

駐顏益壽 is to halt the ageing of the face and lengthen the years. But every five hundred years Heaven sends something, and the first is lightning. Note that the escape is stated in Chan terms: 見性明心, see your nature and illumine your mind, usually written the other way round as 明心見性. Even the fire escape is Buddhist. 降 is jiàng, to send down, not xiáng, and it recurs right through this speech.

Dodge it, and your years are level with Heaven's; fail to dodge it, and your life ends then and there.

Six words each way. Dodge it and your years are level with Heaven's; miss and you are finished on the spot. 躲得過 and 躲不過 both take 得 as de. (躲不過 takes bú before the falling tone of 過.)

After another five hundred years, Heaven sends down a fire-calamity to burn you. This fire is no heavenly fire, nor any mortal fire — it is called yin-fire.

The second calamity, and notice how carefully it is not defined. Not heavenly fire, not mortal fire: 陰火, yin-fire — which turns out to be worse than either. (不是 takes bú, twice.)

It kindles from below, at the Bubbling-Spring point of your own body, and shoots straight up through the Ní-yuán Palace; the five viscera turn to ash, the four limbs all rot, and a thousand years of austerities are made empty illusion.

Worse, because it starts inside you. 湧泉穴 (yǒng quán xué), the Bubbling Spring point, is KI-1 on the sole of the foot, the lowest acupoint on the body, and the fire runs from there straight up to the crown. The text writes 泥垣宮 (with 垣 yuán); the standard inner-alchemy term is 泥丸宮 (ní wán gōng), the upper cinnabar field in the top of the skull. So the path is sole to crown — the exact route the cultivation itself runs along. 苦行 is austerities, and a thousand years of them 俱為虛幻, all of it turned to empty illusion.

After another five hundred years, a wind-calamity is sent down to blow upon you. This wind is no wind of the four quarters, nor the balmy southern or cold northern wind, nor any breeze through flowers, willows, pines, or bamboo — it is called the Bì-wind.

The third, defined by three rounds of what it is not. Not the winds of the four quarters; not 和薰金朔風, the mild balmy south wind (薰 xūn) or the metallic northern one (朔 shuò); not the breeze through flowers, willows, pines or bamboo. It is the 贔風 — 贔 (bì) a rare character, familiar mainly from 贔屭, the tortoise that carries stone steles on its back. (不是 takes bú, all three times.)

It blows in through the fontanelle into the six bowels, passes the cinnabar field, pierces the nine orifices; bone and flesh dissolve away, and the body comes apart of itself.

And again it comes in through the body's own doors. 顖門 (xìn mén) is the fontanelle, the soft spot at the crown of the skull — 顖 is a variant of 囟. From there through the six bowels, the cinnabar field and the nine orifices, until bone and flesh thin away and 其身自解, the body comes apart of its own accord. 解 is jiě, to dissolve, not jiè or xiè.

And so all of them must be dodged."

都 is dōu, all. Three of them, and every one has to be dodged.