In making your way through the world, be sure to keep a blade set over the heart; in mending the self, mind well the character “and” set beside the inch.
As the old saying has it, the character for “blade” is a man's very stock-in-trade; only think thrice, and guard against wrath and deceit.
The highest sort, who never contend, are handed down through all antiquity; the sage, cherishing virtue, carries it on into his own age.
The hard and forceful will always meet a harder, stronger kind; and in the end it all comes down to emptiness and error.
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. 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. Do not think to work your magic on me.”
The pilgrim laughed. “What a small-minded fellow you are, sir! If you want the tree brought back to life, where is the difficulty? Had you said so at the outset, would it not have spared us a whole bout of wrangling?”
Said the Great Immortal, “No quarrel -- and would I be so ready to let you off?”
The pilgrim said, “Release my master, and I will restore you a living tree -- how is that?”
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.”
The pilgrim said, “That is no hard matter. Let them go, and old Monkey will see to it that you get your living tree.”
Reckoning that Monkey could not escape him, the Great Immortal ordered Tripitaka, Bajie, and Sha Monk set free. Sha Monk said, “Master, there's no telling what mischief our elder brother is cooking up.”
Bajie said, “What mischief? This is what they call a ‘kindness-to-your-face’ swindle. The tree is dead -- how can it be cured back to life? He's got up a slick-skinned sham cure to look well, and under the pretense of going to cure the tree, means only to slip away and be off -- as if he'd still spare a thought for you or me!”
Tripitaka said, “He would never dare to abandon us. Let us ask him where he means to go to seek the cure.” So he called out, “Wukong, how did you coax the immortal elder into setting us free?”
The pilgrim said, “Old Monkey spoke true words and honest -- how should I have coaxed him?”
Tripitaka said, “Where will you go to seek the remedy?”
The pilgrim said, “The ancients had a saying: ‘The remedy comes from over the sea.’ Today I mean to go up to the Great Eastern Ocean, to range over the Three Isles and Ten Continents, calling on the immortal elders and holy sages, and to beg a method for raising the dead and restoring life -- I warrant I shall heal his tree back to life.”
Tripitaka said, “How long before you can return from this journey?”
The pilgrim said, “Three days will be enough.”
Tripitaka said, “If that is so, then as you say -- I grant you a limit of three days. Come within the three days and well and good; but if you are not back by the third day's end, I shall recite that little sutra of mine.”
The pilgrim said, “At your command, at your command.”
Watch him now: he hastily straightened his tiger-skin kilt, came out at the gate, and said to the Great Immortal, “Set your mind at rest, sir -- I go, and I return. But you must serve my master well -- three teas and six meals a day, every day, with nothing wanting; and if the least bit is short, old Monkey will settle accounts with you when he returns, and stave in the bottom of your cauldron first of all. When his clothes are soiled, starch and wash them for him. Let his face grow the least bit sallow, and I'll not have it; let him lose the least bit of flesh, and you shall not stir from your gate.”
The Great Immortal said, “Go, go -- I will surely not let him go hungry.”
Fine Monkey King! He leapt up on his somersault cloud, took his leave of the Five-Villages Abbey, and made straight for the Great Eastern Ocean. High in the air, swift as a lightning-flash, quick as a shooting star, he came in no time to the immortal realm of Penglai. Reining in his cloud, he looked down and gazed carefully -- a truly fine place indeed. There is a poem to prove it:
On the great earth, an immortals' land where ranks of sages throng; Penglai, now parting, now joined, holds down the surging waves.
The jasper terrace dips its reflection where the heart of heaven is cold; the great gate-towers' light floats high upon the ocean's face.
Mists and glow of five hues enfold the jade pipes' music; from the ninefold empyrean, star and moon strike the golden turtle.
The Queen Mother of the Western Pool comes often to this place, to offer the three immortals her peaches, time and again.
The pilgrim, who could not take in all the immortal scenery, went straight on into Penglai. Just as he was walking along, he saw, outside the White Cloud Cave, in the shade of the pines, three old men at a game of go: watching the board was the Star of Longevity, and playing the match were the Stars of Fortune and Rank. The pilgrim stepped up and called out, “Greetings, old brothers -- my respects to you!”
Seeing him, the three Stars swept aside the go-board, returned his bow, and said, “What brings the Great Sage here?”
The pilgrim said, “I've come on purpose to look you up for a bit of fun.”
Said the Star of Longevity, “I have heard that the Great Sage forsook the Dao for the Buddha, risking life and limb to guard the Tang Monk on his journey west for the scriptures, toiling day after day along the mountain roads. Where would you find the leisure to come amusing yourself?”
The pilgrim said, “To tell you gentlemen the truth, old Monkey, on the road west, has met with a bit of a hitch halfway along, and I've come with a small matter to ask of you -- I wonder whether you'll oblige?”
Said the Star of Fortune, “And what place was this? What has held you up? Pray set it out plainly for me, that I may deal with it.”
The pilgrim said, “It was in passing the Five-Villages Abbey on the Mountain of Ten Thousand Years that I ran into trouble.”
The three elders said in astonishment, “The Five-Villages Abbey is the immortal palace of the Great Immortal Zhenyuan -- don't tell us you've gone and stolen and eaten his ginseng fruit?”
The pilgrim laughed. “And what would stealing and eating a few of them amount to?”
The three elders said, “You monkey, you don't know good from bad! That fruit -- merely to smell it is to live three hundred and sixty years; and to eat but one is to live forty-seven thousand years. It is called the Grass-of-Ten-Thousand-Years Reverted Elixir. Our own attainment in the Dao falls far short of his. He came by it very easily, and may live as long as heaven itself; but we must still nourish the essence, refine the breath, and preserve the spirit, harmonize dragon and tiger, seize kǎn and fill lí -- who knows at what cost of labor. How can you say his fruit is of so little account? In all the world there is only this one numinous root.”
The pilgrim said, “Numinous root, numinous root -- well, I've gone and given his root a clean cut!”
The three elders said in alarm, “How -- severed at the root?”
The pilgrim said, “The other day, when we were at his abbey, the Great Immortal was away from home, and only two young acolytes received my master; they presented two ginseng fruits to him. My master did not recognize them, and taking them for infants not yet three days old, refused again and again to eat. So the boys carried them off and ate them, without so much as offering us a share. Then old Monkey went and stole three of them, and we three brothers ate them. The boys, knowing no measure, railed at us without end, calling us thieves to our faces and behind our backs. So old Monkey lost his temper, dealt his tree a blow of the cudgel and pushed it over on the ground: the fruit all gone, the boughs split and the leaves fallen, roots laid bare and branches broken -- withered and dead. Little did we think the boys would lock us in -- but old Monkey twisted the lock open, and off we went.”
“The next morning the master came home and gave chase; in the midst of question and answer our words fell out, and we came to blows. But with a flick he spread his gown-sleeve and swept the whole lot of us up inside it. Bound about with cords and ropes, questioned under the lash and the rod, we were beaten a whole day long. That night we escaped again, and again he overtook us and swept us up as before. He carried not an inch of steel -- only a deer-tail whisk to ward and parry -- yet for all our three sorts of weapons, we could not so much as land a blow. This time he disposed of us just as before: my master and two brothers he wrapped in cloth and lacquered over, while me he set to boil in a cauldron of oil. I worked another of my escape-tricks and got away, and smashed his cauldron for good measure. Seeing he could not hold me, he was left thoroughly nettled at me. So I talked him round in a friendly way: let him release my master and brothers, and I would cure his tree and warrant it live, and both sides would be at peace. Remembering the saying ‘the remedy comes from over the sea,’ I have come on purpose to tour the immortal realms and call on you three old brothers. If you have any tree-healing prescription, pass one on to me, that I may quickly rescue the Tang Monk from his plight.”
Hearing this, the three Stars too were troubled at heart, and said, “You monkey, you know nothing of people! That Zhenyuan is the patriarch of the earth-immortals, and we are the founders of the spirit-immortals; but you, though you have won to the rank of a heaven-immortal, are still of the scattered ranks of Taiyi, not yet entered upon the true stream -- how could you ever slip out of his hand? Had the Great Sage struck dead some running beast or flying bird, some insect or scaly creature, a single grain of our millet-elixir could bring it back to life. But that ginseng fruit is the root of an immortal tree -- how is it to be healed? There is no remedy -- no remedy at all.”
When the pilgrim heard there was no remedy, his brows knit into a double lock and a thousand furrows creased his forehead. Said the Star of Fortune, “Great Sage, if there's no remedy here, perhaps there is one elsewhere -- why fall at once into gloom?”
The pilgrim said, “To seek a remedy elsewhere is easy enough -- to roam to the sea's corners and the sky's edge, or wind clean through the thirty-six heavens, would be no great matter. The trouble is that Elder Tang of mine, strict in the Law and narrow in patience, has granted me but a three-day term; if I'm not back within the three days, he'll start reciting that Tight-Fillet Spell.”
The three Stars laughed. “Good, good, good -- were it not for this little trick to keep you in check, you'd be boring holes in the sky again.”
Said the Star of Longevity, “Set your mind at ease, Great Sage -- there's no need to fret. That Great Immortal, though he ranks a generation above us, is nonetheless an acquaintance of ours. For one thing, we've long been parted and never paid our respects; for another, it is a kindness to the Great Sage. So we three will go together to look in on him, put your case to him, and bid the Tang monk hold off the Tight-Fillet Spell -- never mind three days or five, but wait until you've found your remedy before we take our leave.”
The pilgrim said, “I'm much obliged, much obliged! Then I beg you three old brothers to be on your way -- and off I go.” The Great Sage took leave of the three Stars, and of this we say no more.
Now these three Stars mounted their auspicious light and came at once toward the Five-Villages Abbey. In the abbey, the whole assembled company suddenly heard the cry of cranes across the vast sky -- it was the three elders, come to grace them with a visit. And this is what was seen:
Filling the sky, dense and glowing, the auspicious light clusters thick; through the empyrean, drifting everywhere, a rich fragrance hangs.
A thousand strands of colored mist enfold their feathered robes; a single wisp of gossamer cloud upholds their immortal feet.
Green simurghs wing, cinnabar phoenixes soar; their sleeves draw a fragrant wind that sweeps the ground all round.
On dragon-carved staffs they lean, smiling with delight; white beards like hanging jade brush against their breasts.
Childlike of face, glad and untroubled; robust of frame, majestic, brimming with good fortune.
They hold the star-tallies, adding to the sea-house's count; at their waists hang gourds and precious talismans.
Through myriad cycles and a thousand decades their fortune and long life endure; over the Ten Continents and Three Isles they lodge as chance may lead.
Ever they come to the world to bestow a thousand blessings; ever toward mankind they add a hundredfold of fortune.
They span heaven and earth, glorious in fortune and rank; boundless in blessing and long life -- and today, to our joy, they are here.
The three elders, riding the auspicious clouds, come to call on the Great Immortal; and in that hall of blessing, the harmonious air knows no bound.
The immortal boy caught sight of them and hastened to report, “Master, the three Stars from over the sea have come!” Zhenyuan, who was just then chatting idly with the Tang Monk and his disciples, heard the report and came down the steps at once to welcome them.
When Bajie saw the Star of Longevity, he pressed up and caught hold of him, laughing, “You fat-headed old fellow -- haven't seen you in ages, and still as dapper as ever! But you've not brought so much as a cap to wear.” With that he clapped one of his own monk's caps down on the Star's head, and slapping his hands, guffawed, “Good, good, good -- now it's truly a case of ‘cap and promotion’!”
The Star of Longevity flung the cap down and scolded, “You clumsy oaf -- great grown thing that you are, and no sense of high or low!”
Bajie said, “I'm no blockhead -- it's you lot who are the real lackeys.”
Said the Star of Fortune, “Why, you're the blockhead -- and yet you dare call others lackeys?”
Bajie laughed again, “Well, if you're nobody's lackeys, then I suppose you're to be called ‘Longevity-added,’ ‘Fortune-added,’ and ‘Rank-added’?” Tripitaka shouted Bajie back, hastily straightened his robe, and made his bows to the three Stars.
The three Stars greeted the Great Immortal with the courtesies of juniors, and only then sat down to talk. Once settled, the Star of Rank said, “We have long been strangers to your honored countenance. We have been remiss in our respects; today, because the Great Sage Sun has thrown your immortal mountain into turmoil, we have come on purpose to call.”
The Great Immortal said, “So Sun the pilgrim has gone off to Penglai?”
Said the Star of Longevity, “Just so. Because he damaged your cinnabar tree, he came to us seeking a prescription to heal it. We had no remedy, so he has gone on to seek elsewhere; but fearing he may overrun the holy monk's three-day term, and that the Tight-Fillet Spell will then be recited, we have come, firstly to pay our respects, and secondly to beg an extension of the term.”
Hearing this, Tripitaka answered at once, over and over, “I would not dare recite it -- I would not dare.”
Just as they were talking, in ran Bajie again, caught hold of the Star of Fortune, and demanded fruit to eat. He fumbled about in the Star's sleeves and rummaged at his waist, ceaselessly lifting his garments to search him over. Tripitaka said with a laugh, “What sort of manners are these, Bajie!”
Bajie said, “It's not bad manners -- this is what's called ‘fortune at every turn.’” Tripitaka again ordered him out with a shout. The blockhead stepped out the door, and, glaring at the Star of Fortune, fixed him with an unblinking, spiteful stare.
Said the Star of Fortune, “You oaf -- when did I ever provoke you, that you glower at me so?”
Bajie said, “I don't hate you -- this is called ‘turning the head to look toward fortune.’”
Coming out the door, the blockhead spied a young acolyte carrying four tea-spoons, just going to fetch cups and fruit to serve tea; he snatched them clean away, ran up into the hall, took up a little chime, and beat and banged it with his hand, larking about at both ends.
The Great Immortal said, “This monk grows more unruly by the moment.”
Bajie laughed, “It's not disrespect -- this is what's called ‘blessings through the four seasons.’”
But we shall say no more of Bajie's clowning and pestering. Rather let us tell how the pilgrim, springing up on his auspicious cloud, left Penglai and came in no time to the immortal mountain of Fangzhang -- and a truly fine place it was. There is a poem to prove it:
Fangzhang towers lofty, a separate heaven of its own; in the palace-halls of Great Prime the immortals gather.
From purple terraces light falls on the road of the Three Pure Ones; from flowers and trees a fragrance floats amid five-colored mist.
Golden phoenixes, many of themselves, coil about the flower-towers; and the jade cream -- who is it presses it to water the fields of magic fungus?
The jasper peaches and purple plums are newly come to ripeness -- another token, once again, that ten thousand years have turned for the immortals.
The pilgrim reined in his cloud-head, with no heart for sightseeing. As he walked along, he caught a rich waft of fragrant wind and the cry of a dark crane, and there, off to one side, stood an immortal. And this is what he saw:
Filling the sky, ten thousand shafts of rosy light appear; colored mists drift and flutter, their glow unbroken.
A cinnabar phoenix, a flower in its beak, is fresher still; an azure luan wheels in dance, its cry sweet and bright.
His fortune like the Eastern Sea, his years like the mountains; his looks those of a young child, his body hale.
In his gourd lies hidden a cave-heaven's deathless elixir; at his waist hangs, bright as the sun, a talisman of long life.
Time and again he sends down good omens to the mortal world; how often he has dissolved men's calamities and granted their prayers.
Emperor Wu once summoned him to bestow added years; at the Jasper Pool he attends each Feast of Peaches.
He guides the host of monks to shed their worldly ties, and points open the Great Way, bright as a lightning-flash.
He has bestridden the seas to wish long life, and often goes to Spirit Mountain to pay court before the Buddha.
His holy title is the Great Sovereign Lord of the Eastern Splendor -- first among the immortal kindred of mist and glow.
Sun the pilgrim, a touch bashful, came forward to greet him, calling out, “Sovereign Lord -- my salutations!”
The Sovereign Lord hastily returned the courtesy. “Great Sage -- forgive my failing to meet you. Pray step into my humble dwelling and take some tea.” So, hand in hand with the pilgrim, he went in. Truly it was a shell-gated immortal palace, its jasper pools and jade towers more than the eye could take in. They had just sat down to await the tea when, from behind a kingfisher screen, a young boy came out. And how was he got up?
He wore a Daoist robe that shimmered like drifting sunset; a silken sash bound his waist, its light scattered bright.
On his head a silk kerchief, set with the Dipper's stars; on his feet straw sandals, for roaming the immortal peaks.
He refined the primal truth and shed his native shell; and when the work was done, he had his heart's content.
He saw through to the source of essence, breath, and spirit; his master knew him true, without the least mistake.
Fleeing fame, he now enjoys a life without bound; the sixty-year cycles, round upon round, can lay no hold on him.
Round the winding gallery, up the treasure-tower -- thrice he has filched the immortal peaches of heaven.
Amid a haze of fragrant cloud he stepped from the kingfisher screen -- this little immortal was none other than Dongfang Shuo.
Seeing him, the pilgrim laughed. “So here's the little thief! The Sovereign Lord's place has no peaches for you to steal and eat!”
Dongfang Shuo made his bow toward the seat of honor and answered, “Old thief! What brings you here? My master has no elixir here for you to steal and eat, either.”
The Sovereign Lord called out, “Manqian, no more of your nonsense -- bring the tea!” Manqian was Dongfang Shuo's Daoist name; he hurried inside and fetched two cups of tea.
When they had drunk, the pilgrim said, “Old Monkey has come with a matter to ask of you -- I wonder whether you'll grant it?”
The Sovereign Lord said, “What matter is it? I shall be glad to hear it.”
The pilgrim said, “Lately, escorting the Tang Monk westward, we passed the Five-Villages Abbey on the Mountain of Ten Thousand Years. When his young acolytes were insolent, I flew into a fit of temper and pushed his ginseng-fruit tree over; now we're held up, the Tang Monk cannot get free, and I've come to your honored self to beg a prescription to heal it -- I earnestly hope you'll be generous.”
The Sovereign Lord said, “You monkey -- heedless of all consequence, you go stirring up trouble wherever you turn. That Zhenyuan of the Five-Villages Abbey -- his holy title is ‘Coeval with the Age’ -- is the patriarch of the earth-immortals; how could you go and affront him? His ginseng-fruit tree is a very herb-elixir; even to have stolen and eaten the fruit would be a crime -- but you toppled the whole tree besides. Will he let the matter rest?”
The pilgrim said, “That's just it. We got away, but he overtook us and, treating us like so many sweat-rags, swept the whole lot of us up in one sleeve -- which is why I'm so put out. Having no other recourse, I promised to seek a remedy and cure it -- and so I come to entreat you.”
The Sovereign Lord said, “I have a pellet of Nine-Cycle Taiyi Reverted Elixir, but it can only heal the living creatures of this world -- it cannot mend a tree. A tree is a spirit of earth and wood, nourished by heaven and moistened by the ground. Were it some common fruit-tree of the mortal world, a cure might yet be managed; but this Mountain of Ten Thousand Years is a blessed ground of the Prior Heaven, the Five-Villages Abbey a cave-paradise of Aparagodānīya, and the ginseng fruit a numinous root born with the parting of heaven and earth -- how could it be healed? There is no remedy -- no remedy.”
The pilgrim said, “Since there's no remedy, old Monkey will take his leave.” The Sovereign Lord still wished to detain him with a cup of jade nectar, but the pilgrim said, “The rescue is urgent -- I dare not linger.” So he mounted his cloud and came next to the sea-isle of Yingzhou -- another fine place indeed. There is a poem to prove it:
Pearl-trees, exquisite, shine through the purple haze; the palaces of Yingzhou reach up to touch the heavens.
Green hills and emerald waters, and the bright bloom of jasper flowers; jade nectar, and Kunwu steel hard as iron and stone.
The five-hued jade-cock crows to the sea-borne sun; the millennial cinnabar phoenix drinks the vermilion mist.
Men of the world can never fathom the scene within the gourd; beyond all forms, its springtime light endures a hundred million years.
The Great Sage reached Yingzhou, and there beneath the cinnabar cliffs and pearl-trees he saw several white-haired, hoary-bearded figures -- immortals with children's faces and cranelike temples -- playing go, drinking wine, and laughing over their songs. Truly it was a scene like this:
Auspicious clouds brimming with light, propitious haze afloat with fragrance.
Bright luan-birds cry at the cavern mouth; dark cranes dance upon the mountain crest.
Green lotus-root and water-peaches serve as their wine-relish; interlacing pears and fiery jujubes grant a thousand autumns of life.
Not one of them has heard a summons in cinnabar; yet each is enrolled by immortal talisman.
At ease, they drift as the waves may carry them; free and unbound, they yield to the pure and secluded.
The circling sixty-year cycles can lay no hold on them; in all the earth, in heaven and earth, they are only free.
Dark gibbons offering fruit attend them, pair by pair, in fond devotion;
White deer with flowers in their mouths bow down before them, two by two, in close and tender fellowship.
The old fellows were just then making merry at their ease. The pilgrim called out in a loud voice, “And what if you let me join the fun for a while?” Seeing him, the assembled immortals hastened forward to greet him. There is a poem to prove it:
The ginseng-fruit tree, its numinous root snapped; the Great Sage, seeking immortals, begs a wondrous cure.
Through coiling cinnabar mists he came forth from the treasure-grove; the Nine Elders of Yingzhou came out to receive him.
The pilgrim knew them for the Nine Elders and said with a laugh, “You old brothers do take your ease!”
The Nine Elders said, “Great Sage, had you in those days kept to the right and not made havoc in Heaven, you would be freer even than we. But it has turned out well: we hear you have returned to the true path and turned west to worship the Buddha -- so how do you come to have leisure to be here?”
The pilgrim laid out the whole matter of healing the tree and seeking a remedy, from beginning to end. The Nine Elders too were greatly startled. “What a maker of trouble you are -- trouble indeed! We truly have no remedy.”
The pilgrim said, “Since there's no remedy, I'll take my leave.” The Nine Elders would still have kept him, to drink jasper wine and eat green lotus-root. But the pilgrim would by no means sit; standing, he drank a single cup of nectar and ate one piece of lotus-root, then hurriedly left Yingzhou and turned straight back across the Great Eastern Ocean.
Soon he sighted Mount Potalaka not far off, brought down his cloud-head, and came straight to the Putuo Cliff, where he found the Bodhisattva Guanyin in her purple bamboo grove, expounding the scriptures to the devas, to Moksa, and to the Dragon Maiden. There is a poem to prove it:
The sea-lord's city stands high, its auspicious vapors thick; behold besides its wonders, marvels without end.
Know that, past a thousand things dimly half-seen, all issues forth from a single rarefied essence.
The Four Sages, when taught in season, attain the true fruit; the Six Common Orders, having heard, escape the cage.
The Shaolin has a true savor all its own; fragrant with flower and fruit, its trees are heavy with red.
The Bodhisattva had already seen the pilgrim coming, and at once bade the Mountain-Guardian go to meet him. The Guardian came out of the grove and called, “Sun Wukong -- where do you think you're going?”
The pilgrim looked up and barked, “You bear-brute -- is ‘Wukong’ a name for the likes of you to bandy? Had old Monkey not spared you at the start, you'd be a corpse-ghost of Black Wind Mountain by now. And now, following the Bodhisattva, having gained a good reward, dwelling on this immortal mountain and hearing the Dharma daily -- can't you even call me ‘sir’?”
The Black Bear had indeed attained the true fruit, guarding Potalaka in the Bodhisattva's service and styled a Great Guardian -- and for that, in truth, he had the pilgrim to thank. He could only force a smile and say, “Great Sage, the ancients had it: ‘The gentleman bears no grudge for old wrongs.’ Why keep bringing it up? The Bodhisattva sent me to welcome you.”
At this the pilgrim composed himself into grave respect, and went with the Guardian into the purple bamboo grove to pay homage to the Bodhisattva.
The Bodhisattva said, “Wukong, how far has the Tang Monk come on his road?”
The pilgrim said, “We've come as far as the Mountain of Ten Thousand Years in the Western Continent of Aparagodānīya.”
The Bodhisattva said, “On that Mountain of Ten Thousand Years stands the Five-Villages Abbey -- have you met the Great Immortal Zhenyuan?”
The pilgrim knocked his head to the ground and said, “It was at the Five-Villages Abbey -- your disciple, not knowing the Great Immortal Zhenyuan, harmed his ginseng-fruit tree and gave offense; and he has held my master fast, so that we cannot go on.”
The Bodhisattva, who understood it well, said reprovingly, “You reckless ape, you know no better -- his ginseng-fruit tree is a numinous root from the opening of heaven and the cleaving of earth. Zhenyuan is the patriarch of the earth-immortals -- even I give him three parts' deference; how could you go and wound his tree?”
The pilgrim bowed again and said, “Your disciple truly did not know. That day he was away from home, and only two immortal boys attended us. It was Zhu Wuneng who learned he had such fruit and wanted to taste the novelty; so your disciple did indeed steal three, and we brothers shared and ate them. The boys found out and railed at us without end; and so your disciple, in a rage, pushed his tree over. The next day he came back and overtook us, swept us all up in one sleeve, bound us with cords and lashed us with the whip, and beat us a whole day long. That night we broke free, but again he overtook us and swept us up as before. Two or three times over -- there was truly no escaping him. Having promised to heal his tree, I have just been seeking a cure over the sea, ranging the three isles -- but not one of the immortals has the power. And so your disciple, with undivided heart, does reverence and comes expressly to lay his petition before the Bodhisattva: I humbly pray your compassion, that you grant a remedy and save the Tang Monk to hasten west.”
The Bodhisattva said, “Why did you not come to me at the first, instead of going off to search the isles?”
Hearing these words, the pilgrim rejoiced in secret. “What luck, what luck -- the Bodhisattva must have a remedy!” He pressed forward again and earnestly entreated her.
The Bodhisattva said, “The sweet-dew water at the bottom of my pure vase can well heal an immortal tree or numinous sprout.”
The pilgrim said, “Has it ever been tried and proven?”
The Bodhisattva said, “It has been proven.”
The pilgrim asked, “And what was the proof?”
The Bodhisattva said, “In years past, the Most High Lord Lao made a wager with me: he pulled up my willow-branch, put it in his elixir-furnace, roasted it black and dry, and sent it back to me. I took it and set it in my vase, and in a day and a night it regained its green boughs and leaves, just as before.”
The pilgrim laughed. “True luck indeed, true luck indeed! If even a thing roasted black could be healed back to life, how much less trouble is a mere toppled tree!”
The Bodhisattva instructed her assembly, “Keep watch over the grove; I shall go and soon return.” Then, bearing her pure vase in hand, with the white parrot warbling sweetly before her, she set out, the Great Sage Sun following behind. There is a poem to prove it:
Her jade-white brow-curl, her golden form -- the world can find no words for them; she is indeed the Compassionate One who saves from suffering.
In a past kalpa she met the Undefiled Buddha; and to this day has become a manifest, active body.
Through many lives she has stilled the waves of the sea of desire; her whole field of heart is without a mote of dust.
Her sweet dew, long proven, is a truly wondrous art -- it will surely keep the precious tree in everlasting spring.
Now the Great Immortal of the abbey was chatting quietly with the three elders when he suddenly saw the Great Sage Sun bring down his cloud, calling, “The Bodhisattva has come -- quick, go and receive her, quick!” In a flurry the three Stars, Master Zhenyuan, and the Tang Monk with his disciples all came out together from the treasure-hall to meet her. The Bodhisattva had scarcely halted her auspicious cloud when she exchanged courtesies first with Master Zhenyuan and then greeted the three Stars; and when the greetings were done, she took her seat. There before the steps, the pilgrim led the Tang Monk, Bajie, and Sha Monk, and all made their bows. The various immortals of the abbey came too, to pay their respects.
The pilgrim said, “Great Immortal, no need to dither -- set out the incense table straightaway, and let the Bodhisattva go and mend that fruit-tree of yours.”
The Great Immortal bowed and thanked the Bodhisattva. “So trifling a matter -- how could I presume to trouble your descent?”
The Bodhisattva said, “The Tang Monk is my disciple, and Sun Wukong has given you offense; by rights I ought to make good your precious tree.”
The three elders said, “If so, then no more of these modest words -- let the Bodhisattva come to the garden and see for herself.”
The Great Immortal at once ordered the incense table set out and the back garden swept, and invited the Bodhisattva to go before, the three elders following after. When the Tang Monk's party and the immortals of the abbey had all come into the garden to look, there lay the tree, toppled on the ground -- the soil split and the roots laid bare, the leaves fallen and the branches withered.
The Bodhisattva called, “Wukong, put out your hand.” The pilgrim opened out his left hand. The Bodhisattva dipped her willow-branch in the sweet dew from the vase and traced on the pilgrim's palm a talisman-sign for raising the dead to life; then she bade him lay his hand beneath the tree's roots, watching until water came forth, and take that for the measure. The pilgrim closed his fist and pressed it down beneath the roots of the tree, and in a moment a pool of clear spring-water welled up.
The Bodhisattva said, “That water must touch no vessel of the Five Phases; scoop it with a jade dipper, raise the tree upright, and pour it down from the top -- then of itself the root and bark will knit, leaves grow and sprouts appear, the boughs green and the fruit come forth.”
The pilgrim said, “You little Daoist priests -- fetch a jade dipper, quick.”
Master Zhenyuan said, “This poor priest's humble mountain has no jade dipper -- only jade tea-cups and jade wine-cups. Will they do?”
The Bodhisattva said, “So long as they are jade and can scoop the water, they will serve -- bring them here and let me see.”
The Great Immortal at once bade the young boys bring out some twenty or thirty tea-cups and forty or fifty wine-cups, and with them scooped up the clear spring from beneath the roots. The pilgrim, Bajie, and Sha Monk hoisted the tree upright, propped it straight and heaped the soil about it, then bowl by bowl brought the Bodhisattva the sweet spring from the jade vessels. The Bodhisattva sprinkled it over, fine and slow, with her willow-branch, chanting the while a scripture-spell.
In a little while, when all the scooped water had been sprinkled out, the tree was indeed as before -- green and lush, its foliage dense and shadowy, and upon it twenty-three ginseng fruits.
The two boys, Clear Wind and Bright Moon, said, “The other day, when the fruit went missing, count as we might we found only twenty-two -- now that it's come back to life, how is there one more?”
The pilgrim said, “‘Time reveals a man's heart.’ The other day old Monkey stole only three; one of them fell to the ground, and the local earth-god said this treasure sinks into the soil it touches. Bajie kept insisting I'd held one back for myself, so the truth got muddled -- and only now, at last, is it made plain.”
The Bodhisattva said, “The reason I would not use a vessel of the Five Phases just now is that I knew this thing stands in mutual dread of the Five Phases.”
The Great Immortal, overjoyed, hastily called for the golden mallet, knocked down ten of the fruits, and invited the Bodhisattva and the three elders back to the treasure-hall -- first to thank them for their pains, and second to hold a Ginseng-Fruit Feast. The lesser immortals set out tables and chairs and laid the cinnabar trays; the Bodhisattva was seated at the head in the place of honor, the three elders to the left, the Tang Monk to the right, and Master Zhenyuan at the near seat to keep them company -- and each ate a fruit. There is a poem to prove it:
In the Mountain of Ten Thousand Years, an ancient cave-heaven; the ginseng fruit, once ripened, lasts nine thousand years.
When the numinous root lay bared, its sprouts and boughs were broken; the sweet dew's quickening made fruit and leaf whole again.
The three elders, glad to meet, are all old friends; the four monks, by happy chance, are joined by a bond from lives before.
From this day, all who share and eat the ginseng fruit shall be immortals of unaging, everlasting life.
Now the Bodhisattva and the three elders each ate a fruit; the Tang Monk, realizing at last that it was a treasure of the immortals, ate one too; Wukong and his two brothers each ate one; Master Zhenyuan kept them company with one; and the immortals of the abbey shared one among them. The pilgrim then thanked the Bodhisattva, who returned to the Putuo Cliff, and saw the three Stars off, straight back to their island of Penglai.
Master Zhenyuan then laid out a vegetarian feast with wine, and became sworn brothers with the pilgrim. This, indeed, was a case of “no blows, no friendship” -- the two households now made one. Master and disciples, all four, were merry and glad, and as evening fell they took their rest. As for the elder, his case was just this:
By fated chance he ate the herb-wrought reverted elixir; yet, long-lived, he must still bitterly endure the demons' ordeals.
How, in the end, they would take their leave on the morrow -- that you shall hear told in the next chapter.