沙僧捨身 Sha Wujing Resolves to Die
沙僧已綑在那裡,見妖精兇惡之甚,把公主摜倒在地,持刀要殺,他心中暗想道:「分明是他有書去,救了我師父,此是莫大之恩。我若一口說出,他就把公主殺了,此卻不是恩將仇報?罷罷罷,想老沙跟我師父一場,也沒寸功報效,今日已此被縛,就將此性命與師父報了恩罷。」沙僧已捆在那里,见妖精凶恶之甚,把公主掼倒在地,持刀要杀,他心中暗想道:「分明是他有书去,救了我师父,此是莫大之恩。我若一口说出,他就把公主杀了,此却不是恩将仇报?罢罢罢,想老沙跟我师父一场,也没寸功报效,今日已此被缚,就将此性命与师父报了恩罢。」
逐句解 Line by line
Sha the Monk, bound where he lay, saw how murderously savage the fiend had grown — hurling the princess to the ground, blade in hand, bent on the kill — and thought within himself: "It is plain that she did send the letter, and thereby saved my master; this is a kindness beyond all measure.
Sha grasps at once what the reader knows: the princess’s letter is what delivered Tripitaka, a 莫大之恩 ("kindness beyond measure") he feels bound to requite. In 兇惡之甚 the graph 甚 is read shèn ("in the extreme"); in 摜倒, 倒 is dǎo ("to hurl, throw down").
If I speak out with a single word, he will kill the princess on the spot — would that not be to answer kindness with enmity?"
恩將仇報 ("to requite kindness with enmity") is the cardinal ingratitude; the coverb 將 is read jiāng. Sha frames the betrayal of the princess as a moral impossibility.
Enough, enough! For all my time following my master, old Sha has rendered not an inch of merit’s service; and now, bound here as I am, let me lay down this life of mine and repay my master’s kindness."
寸功 ("an inch of merit") measures his sense of having served too little; 就將此性命 ("with this very life") again takes the coverb 將 as jiāng. The vow to trade his life for the debt is Sha Wujing’s defining gesture.
Sha Wujing is the least individuated of the three disciples, but this passage gives him his signature note: a quiet, absolute loyalty that expresses itself not in Wukong’s defiance or Bajie’s self-interest, but in willing self-erasure. He reasons his way to martyrdom in three swift steps — kindness received, betrayal refused, life offered up.
The moral calculus is precise and Confucian: 恩 (kindness) incurs an obligation that 報 (requital) must discharge, and to expose the princess would be 恩將仇報, the very type of ingratitude. Sha dissolves the dilemma by substituting his own life for hers.
This interior monologue is the pivot the preceding passages have prepared. The princess staked her life on the monk’s discretion; here, unheard by her, he resolves to honor that trust to the death.