許醫仙樹 A Bargain to Heal the Tree
卻說那鎮元大仙用手攙著行者道：「我也知道你的本事，我也聞得你的英名，只是你今番越理欺心，縱有騰那，脫不得我手。我就和你講到西天，見了你那佛祖，也少不得還我人參果樹。你莫弄神通。」行者笑道：「你這先生，好小家子樣。若要樹活，有甚疑難？早說這話，可不省了一場爭競？」大仙道：「不爭競，我肯善自饒你！」行者道：「你解了我師父，我還你一棵活樹如何？」大仙道：「你若有此神通，醫得樹活，我與你八拜為交，結為兄弟。」行者道：「不打緊，放了他們，老孫管教還你活樹。」却说那镇元大仙用手搀著行者道：「我也知道你的本事，我也闻得你的英名，只是你今番越理欺心，纵有腾那，脱不得我手。我就和你讲到西天，见了你那佛祖，也少不得还我人参果树。你莫弄神通。」行者笑道：「你这先生，好小家子样。若要树活，有甚疑难？早说这话，可不省了一场争竞？」大仙道：「不争竞，我肯善自饶你！」行者道：「你解了我师父，我还你一棵活树如何？」大仙道：「你若有此神通，医得树活，我与你八拜为交，结为兄弟。」行者道：「不打紧，放了他们，老孙管教还你活树。」
逐句解 Line by line
Now the Great Immortal Zhenyuan took the pilgrim by the arm and said: “I know your powers well enough, and I have heard your famous name; but this time you have flouted all reason and cheated your own conscience. For all your shifting tricks, you shall not slip out of my hand.
攙著 (chān zhe) ("holding by the arm") is a gesture of forced courtesy — the Immortal keeps his captive close. 越理欺心 ("to overstep reason and deceive the heart") charges Wukong with wronging his own conscience. 騰那 is a variant of 騰挪, the art of shifting and dodging by transformation; the graph 那 here stands for 挪 (nuó), not the common demonstrative nà.
Even were I to argue the case with you all the way to the Western Heaven, before your own Buddha-patriarch you would still have to give me back my ginseng-fruit tree.
佛祖 is the Buddha as founding patriarch of the faith. 還 here is read huán, "to give back, restore," not the common hái ("still, yet"); the tree is the one debt Wukong cannot argue away.
Do not think to work your magic on me.”
神通 (shéntōng) — spiritual powers, the supernatural arts. The Immortal warns that force will avail nothing here.
The pilgrim laughed. “What a small-minded fellow you are, sir!
小家子樣 ("the manner of a petty household") is a colloquial jibe — stingy, mean-spirited. Wukong turns the confrontation into banter, his usual tactic. The suffix 子 is here the neutral-toned zi.
If you want the tree brought back to life, where is the difficulty?
有甚疑難 — "what problem is there?" — with 甚 in its bare interrogative sense (shèn, = "what"). Wukong’s breezy confidence sets up the wager.
Had you said so at the outset, would it not have spared us a whole bout of wrangling?”
省 (shěng), "to save, to spare"; 爭競, "contention, a quarrel." The line lightly mocks the Immortal for fighting when a bargain lay there for the asking.
Said the Great Immortal, “No quarrel — and would I be so ready to let you off?”
善自饒你 — "readily to pardon you." The Immortal concedes, in effect, that the fight was the price of any settlement.
The pilgrim said, “Release my master, and I will restore you a living tree — how is that?”
解, "to untie, to set free"; 還 again huán, "give back, restore." The exchange is now openly a bargain: the pilgrims’ freedom for a cure.
Said the Great Immortal, “If you have the power to heal the tree back to life, I will make you my sworn friend with eight bows, and we shall be as brothers.”
八拜為交 ("to become sworn friends with eight bows") is the formal rite of brotherhood; 結為兄弟 seals it. In both, 為 is read wéi, "to become." The pledge foreshadows the chapter’s close.
The pilgrim said, “That is no hard matter. Let them go, and old Monkey will see to it that you get your living tree.”
不打緊 — "no great matter, easily done." 管教 ("I guarantee that…") is Wukong’s habitual boast; 還 once more huán, "restore."
The chapter opens in a register of comic reversal. Only pages before, the Immortal Zhenyuan and the Great Sage were trading magical blows; now the Immortal, gripping Wukong fast by the arm, discovers that his prisoner is perfectly willing to help — for a price. The stand-off dissolves into bargaining, and Wukong, characteristically, seizes the upper hand by treating the whole affair as an absurdity ("Had you said so at the outset…").
The negotiation turns on a single non-negotiable point: the tree must be restored. Zhenyuan is unmoved by threats of appeal — "even before your own Buddha" the debt stands — and Wukong, for all his bluster, never denies it. The wager they strike, freedom for a cure, sets the plot of the chapter in motion and supplies its shape: a quest for the remedy that will fill the next several episodes.
The offer of brotherhood (八拜為交) is the seed of the reconciliation to come. What began in violation and a brawl will end, by the chapter’s last page, in sworn kinship — an arc the reader can already glimpse in the Immortal’s promise.