祥雲識聖 The Auspicious Cloud Betrays the Sage
卻說那老怪又喚二魔道：「兄弟，你既拿了八戒，斷然就有唐僧。再去巡巡山來，切莫錯過他去。」二魔道：「就行，就行。」你看他急點起五十名小妖，上山巡邏。正走處，只見祥雲縹緲，瑞氣盤旋，二魔道：「唐僧來了。」眾妖道：「唐僧在那裡？」二魔道：「好人頭上祥雲照頂，惡人頭上黑氣沖天。那唐僧原是金蟬長老臨凡，十世修行的好人，所以有這祥雲縹緲。」却说那老怪又唤二魔道：「兄弟，你既拿了八戒，断然就有唐僧。再去巡巡山来，切莫错过他去。」二魔道：「就行，就行。」你看他急点起五十名小妖，上山巡逻。正走处，只见祥云缥缈，瑞气盘旋，二魔道：「唐僧来了。」众妖道：「唐僧在那里？」二魔道：「好人头上祥云照顶，恶人头上黑气冲天。那唐僧原是金蝉长老临凡，十世修行的好人，所以有这祥云缥缈。」
逐句解 Line by line
Now the old fiend called the second demon again and said: “Brother, since you've taken Bajie, then Tripitaka must surely be near.
既 (jì)…斷然 is a “since…then assuredly” inference: the pig's capture proves the master is close behind. The old demon sends his brother out for a second sweep of the mountain.
“Go patrol the mountain once more, and be sure not to let him slip past.”
巡巡 (xún xún), the reduplicated verb softened to “go have a patrol about”; 切莫 (qiè mò), “be sure not to,” an emphatic prohibition. 錯過 (cuò guò), “to miss, let slip.”
The second fiend said: “At once, at once.”
就行 (jiù xíng), “right away, will do”; 行 here is xíng, “to go, to act,” not the háng of ranks or rows. The doubling conveys eager compliance.
Watch as he hurriedly mustered fifty little imps and went up the mountain on patrol.
你看 (nǐ kàn), “watch now,” the storyteller drawing the listener's eye. 點起 (diǎn qǐ), “to muster, call up (troops)”; 巡邏 (xún luó), “to patrol.”
Just as they went, he saw auspicious clouds drifting faint and coiling propitious vapors, and the second fiend said: “Tripitaka is coming.”
祥雲縹緲 (xiáng yún piāo miǎo), “auspicious clouds, gossamer-faint,” and 瑞氣盤旋, “propitious ethers wheeling” — the visible aura of a holy man, which the demon can read at a distance.
The imps said: “Where is Tripitaka?”
Again the interrogative 那裡 (nǎ lǐ), “where,” with 那 read nǎ. The rank-and-file demons, lacking their captain's discernment, see no aura and must ask.
The second fiend said: “Over a good man's head auspicious clouds light the crown; over an evil man's head a black vapor shoots to heaven.
A neat physiognomic couplet: virtue and vice each cast their own ether above the head, legible to the initiate. 照頂 (zhào dǐng), “illumines the crown”; 沖天 (chōng tiān), “surges skyward.”
“That Tripitaka was originally the Elder Golden Cicada come down among mortals, a good man of ten lifetimes' cultivation — that is why he bears these gossamer auspicious clouds.”
金蟬長老 (jīn chán zhǎng lǎo), “the Elder Golden Cicada,” Tripitaka's celestial identity, a disciple of the Buddha exiled to ten mortal rebirths; 長老 takes 長 as zhǎng, “elder.” 臨凡 (lín fán), “to descend into the mortal world.”
The narrative returns to the cave only long enough to launch the demon's second sortie, then follows him onto the mountain, where the chapter's supernatural machinery comes into view. The Silver-Horned demon reads the pilgrims' approach not by sight of them but by the aura above them — the luminous cloud that marks sanctity — and expounds to his uncomprehending troops the physiognomy of good and evil ethers.
The passage discloses Tripitaka's cosmic pedigree at the moment of greatest danger: he is the Golden Cicada, the Buddha's own disciple fallen into ten rebirths, and it is precisely this accumulated merit, visible as light, that makes his flesh worth a demon's scheming. The irony sharpens — the very holiness that ought to shield him is what marks him as prey — and it prepares the omen of the next scene, when that unseen aura registers on his body as an involuntary shudder.