蘭盆舊識 Old Friend of the Ullambana Feast
二童道：「師父的故人是誰？望說與弟子，好接待。」大仙道：「他是東土大唐駕下的聖僧，道號三藏，今往西天拜佛求經的和尚。」二童笑道：「孔子云：『道不同，不相為謀。』我等是太乙玄門，怎麼與那和尚做甚相識？」大仙道：「你那裡得知。那和尚乃金蟬子轉生，西方聖老如來佛第二個徒弟。五百年前，我與他在蘭盆會上相識。他曾親手傳茶，佛子敬我，故此是為故人也。」二童道：「师父的故人是谁？望说与弟子，好接待。」大仙道：「他是东土大唐驾下的圣僧，道号三藏，今往西天拜佛求经的和尚。」二童笑道：「孔子云：『道不同，不相为谋。』我等是太乙玄门，怎么与那和尚做甚相识？」大仙道：「你那里得知。那和尚乃金蝉子转生，西方圣老如来佛第二个徒弟。五百年前，我与他在兰盆会上相识。他曾亲手传茶，佛子敬我，故此是为故人也。」
逐句解 Line by line
The two boys said, "Master, who is this old friend?
The boys ask the reasonable question, and the answer will turn out to be a considerable piece of backstory.
Pray tell your disciples, that we may receive him fittingly."
弟子, dì zǐ, disciples — how the boys refer to themselves, with the full honorific 子. 接待, jiē dài, to receive a guest properly.
The Great Immortal said, "He is the holy monk under the Great Tang of the Eastern Land, styled Tripiṭaka — the monk now bound for the Western Heaven to worship the Buddha and seek the scriptures."
道號, dào hào, a religious style-name. 拜佛, worship the Buddha, where 佛 is fó.
The two boys said with a laugh, "Confucius says: 'Those whose ways differ take no counsel together.'
The boys quote Confucius at their master, which is cheeky, and they quote him accurately, which is worse. 道不同，不相為謀 — "those whose ways differ take no counsel together" — is from the Analects, book XV. There is a genuine dispute about one syllable in it. Read with 為 as wèi, "for," the line means each side plans on its own behalf and not the other's; this follows Yáng Bójùn, and is the reading the text takes here. Read with wéi, "to devise," it means simply that they cannot make plans together. The commoner recitation takes the second. 相 is the reciprocal xiāng either way.
We are of the Mystic Gate of the Great Monad — what acquaintance should we have with that monk?"
太乙玄門, Tài yǐ xuán mén, the Mystic Gate of the Great Monad — a Daoist lineage claiming descent from the primal unity itself. The boys are saying: we are the senior branch of the senior tradition, why would we know a monk.
The Great Immortal said, "How should you know?
Watch 那 again. Here it is nǎ, standing for 哪 and meaning "how would you know," not the demonstrative nà. The very next line uses the same character the other way.
That monk is the reincarnation of the Golden Cicada, second disciple of the Holy Elder of the West, the Tathāgata Buddha.
And there it is as nà, "that monk." The disclosure itself is the novel's central piece of backstory: Tripiṭaka is 金蟬子, Jīn chán Zǐ, the Golden Cicada, the Buddha's own second disciple, demoted and reborn on earth. The whole pilgrimage is his way back. 如來佛, the Tathāgata; 轉生, zhuǎn shēng, to be reborn.
Five hundred years ago he and I became acquainted at the Ullambana Feast.
蘭盆會, Lán pén Huì, is the Ullambana assembly — the great Buddhist rite for rescuing the dead from suffering, still observed as the Ghost Festival. Five hundred years ago, a Daoist immortal and a Buddhist disciple were both on the guest list.
With his own hand he once served me tea — a son of Buddha, doing me honour; and so he is an old friend indeed."
And here is what actually made them friends: the young monk poured his tea. Not doctrine, not a shared master, not a debate won — one courtesy, remembered for five centuries. 佛子, fó zǐ, a son of the Buddha, meaning his disciple. 是為 takes 為 as the copular wéi, "is indeed."
The boys' question — who is this old friend? — pulls up the novel's foundational backstory from the Daoist side. Tripiṭaka is the reincarnation of the Golden Cicada, the Buddha's own second disciple, demoted from the assembly and sent to be reborn on earth. The pilgrimage west is his long walk home. The reader has known this since the opening chapters; hearing it from an immortal who knew him personally gives it a different weight.
Before that, though, the boys make a joke at their master's expense, and it is a good one. They quote Confucius: those whose ways differ take no counsel together. Buddhists over there, Daoists over here, so what business do we have with a monk? It is the standard sectarian line, deployed by two teenagers who happen to be twelve hundred years old.
Zhènyuán's answer does not argue with it. He does not claim the ways are secretly one, or win a point about doctrine. He says that five hundred years ago, at the Ullambana feast, this monk poured his tea with his own hands. The friendship rests on a single remembered courtesy — which is the novel's syncretism in miniature, and rather more persuasive than an argument would have been.