三昧神風 The Wind of Samādhi
他兄弟們牽馬挑擔而入，徑至裡邊，拴馬歇擔，與莊老拜見敘坐。又有蒼頭獻茶。茶罷，捧出幾碗胡麻飯。飯畢，命設鋪就寢。行者道：「不睡還可，敢問善人，貴地可有賣眼藥的？」老者道：「是那位長老害眼？」行者道：「不瞞你老人家說，我們出家人自來無病，從不曉得害眼。」老人道：「既不害眼，如何討藥？」行者道：「我們今日在黃風洞口救我師父，不期被那怪將一口風噴來，吹得我眼珠酸痛，今有些眼淚汪汪，故此要尋眼藥。」那老者道：「善哉，善哉！你這個長老，小小的年紀，怎麼說謊？那黃風大王，風最利害。他那風，比不得甚麼春秋風、松竹風與那東西南北風。……」八戒道：「想必是夾腦風、羊耳風、大麻風、偏正頭風？」長者道：「不是，不是。他叫做三昧神風。」行者道：「怎見得？」老者道：「那風能吹天地暗，善刮鬼神愁，裂石崩崖惡，吹人命即休。你們若遇著他那風吹了時，還想得活哩？只除是神仙，方可得無事。」他兄弟们牵马挑担而入，径至里边，拴马歇担，与庄老拜见叙坐。又有苍头献茶。茶罢，捧出几碗胡麻饭。饭毕，命设铺就寝。行者道：「不睡还可，敢问善人，贵地可有卖眼药的？」老者道：「是那位长老害眼？」行者道：「不瞒你老人家说，我们出家人自来无病，从不晓得害眼。」老人道：「既不害眼，如何讨药？」行者道：「我们今日在黄风洞口救我师父，不期被那怪将一口风喷来，吹得我眼珠酸痛，今有些眼泪汪汪，故此要寻眼药。」那老者道：「善哉，善哉！你这个长老，小小的年纪，怎么说谎？那黄风大王，风最利害。他那风，比不得甚么春秋风、松竹风与那东西南北风。……」八戒道：「想必是夹脑风、羊耳风、大麻风、偏正头风？」长者道：「不是，不是。他叫做三昧神风。」行者道：「怎见得？」老者道：「那风能吹天地暗，善刮鬼神愁，裂石崩崖恶，吹人命即休。你们若遇著他那风吹了时，还想得活哩？只除是神仙，方可得无事。」
逐句解 Line by line
The brothers led in the horse and carried in the luggage, went straight through to the inner rooms, tethered the horse and set down the pole, and made their bows to the old squire and sat down with him.
Both occurrences of 擔 read dàn. 莊老 is the old squire of the farmstead — a title, not a name, and he will never be given one.
A house-servant brought tea. When the tea was done, several bowls of sesame rice were set out; and when the meal was over, he ordered bedding laid for them to sleep.
蒼頭, "the grey-head," is a house-servant. 胡麻飯 — sesame rice, the food set before Liu Chen and Ruan Zhao by the immortal maidens of Mount Tiantai, and thus a dish with a provenance. 設鋪 takes 鋪 as pù, the noun (bedding, a bed).
Said the Pilgrim, "Not sleeping would do well enough. But may I ask, good sir, whether in these parts there is anyone who sells eye-medicine?" Said the old man, "Which of the reverend elders suffers in the eyes?"
不睡還可: 還 is hái. 是那位長老害眼 — 那 is interrogative nǎ, "which"; the old man asks the doctor's question first.
Said the Pilgrim, "I will not deceive you, sir. We who have left the household life are never ill, and have never in our lives known what sore eyes are."
不曉得害眼 takes 得 as de. The Pilgrim opens with a boast disguised as candour, and the old man will catch him in it.
Said the old man, "If you have no sore eyes, why do you ask for medicine?"
Eleven graphs, and the trap closes. The old man's logic is impeccable, and it will be the Pilgrim who is caught telling untruths, in a chapter where the whole house is one.
Said the Pilgrim, "Today at the mouth of the Yellow Wind Cave, as we were rescuing our master, that fiend blew a mouthful of wind at us unlooked-for,
噴來: 將 is jiāng. 不期, "unlooked-for," is the Pilgrim conceding surprise.
and it left the balls of my eyes aching sourly, and now they swim with tears; and that is why I want eye-medicine."
眼淚汪汪 — the eyes brimming. The Pilgrim has now told the old man everything he asked not to be told.
Said the old man, "Mercy, mercy! You are a reverend elder of tender years — why do you tell me lies?
善哉，善哉 is a Buddhist exclamation (Sanskrit sādhu), and the old man uses it to accuse a monk of lying. 小小的年紀: the Pilgrim is over five hundred years old.
That Great King of Yellow Wind — his wind is the most terrible of all. It is no common wind: not the wind of spring or autumn, not the wind of the pines and bamboos, nor any wind of east or west or south or north…"
The three 那 are all demonstrative nà; 比不得 takes the potential dé. The 世德堂本 prints an ellipsis, ……」, before the closing quotation mark: the old man is cut off mid-sentence.
"It must be the wind of the brain," said Bajie, "or the sheep's-ear wind, or the great leprous wind, or the wind that splits the head from side to side?"
Bajie interrupts, and does so with four names of diseases — 夾腦風, 羊耳風, 大麻風, 偏正頭風 — all of them genuine terms of Ming medicine in which 風 means a morbid humour, not weather. He has heard the word and reached for the only sense of it he knows.
"No," said the elder, "none of these. It is called the Wind of the Three Samādhis." Said the Pilgrim, "How can that be seen?"
三昧神風: 三昧 is samādhi, meditative absorption. That a demon's wind should carry this name is the chapter's central irony, and it is the old man — himself a spirit — who supplies it. 怎見得 takes 得 as de.
Said the old man, "That wind can blow heaven and earth into darkness, and set the ghosts and spirits grieving; it cracks the stone and brings the cliff down; and a man's life is finished at a breath of it.
Four clauses of five graphs each: 那風能吹天地暗，善刮鬼神愁，裂石崩崖惡，吹人命即休. It is a quatrain in everything but announcement, and because no verse tag introduces it, this edition keeps it as prose — the rule ruled at ch18 and confirmed in ch20.
Should you meet with that wind of his, and it blow upon you — could you hope to be alive? Unless you were an immortal, there would be no coming off unhurt."
遇著 takes 著 as zháo, the resultative: the wind is met, not merely awaited. 還想得活哩 — 得 potential, 哩 the vernacular particle. The old man's last clause is an exemption the Pilgrim is about to claim.
This is the first half of the chapter's second over-long paragraph, divided at the point where the old man finishes his account of the wind. The exchange is a comedy of diagnosis. The Pilgrim, who has never been ill, cannot bring himself to say simply that his eyes hurt; the old man, who is not a man, catches him at once; and Bajie, who has understood nothing, supplies a list of clinical wind-disorders out of a medical primer.
The name, when it comes, is 三昧神風 — the divine wind of the three samādhis. It is the counterpart of the 三昧真火 that will nearly destroy the Pilgrim in chapter 41, and it belongs, properly, to the vocabulary of attainment: samādhi is the concentration of the adept. Put in a demon's mouth on Yellow Wind Ridge, the term does what this novel is always doing with Buddhist terminology — it borrows the word without the doctrine, and lets the reader feel the theft.