受封大聖 Enfeoffed Equal to Heaven
悟空大喜，懇留飲宴不肯，遂與金星縱著祥雲，到南天門外。那些天丁天將都拱手相迎。徑入靈霄殿下。金星拜奏道：「臣奉詔宣弼馬溫孫悟空已到。」玉帝道：「那孫悟空過來，今宣你做個齊天大聖，官品極矣，但切不可胡為。」這猴亦止朝上唱個喏，道聲「謝恩」。玉帝即命工幹官張、魯二班，在蟠桃園右首，起一座齊天大聖府，府內設個二司：一名安靜司，一名寧神司。司俱有仙吏，左右扶持。又差五斗星君送悟空去到任，外賜御酒二瓶，金花十朵，著他安心定志，再勿胡為。那猴王信受奉行，即日與五斗星君到府，打開酒瓶，同眾盡飲。送星官回轉本宮，他才遂心滿意，喜地歡天，在於天宮快樂，無掛無礙。正是：悟空大喜，恳留饮宴不肯，遂与金星纵着祥云，到南天门外。那些天丁天将都拱手相迎。径入灵霄殿下。金星拜奏道：「臣奉诏宣弼马温孙悟空已到。」玉帝道：「那孙悟空过来，今宣你做个齐天大圣，官品极矣，但切不可胡为。」这猴亦止朝上唱个喏，道声「谢恩」。玉帝即命工干官张、鲁二班，在蟠桃园右首，起一座齐天大圣府，府内设个二司：一名安静司，一名宁神司。司俱有仙吏，左右扶持。又差五斗星君送悟空去到任，外赐御酒二瓶，金花十朵，着他安心定志，再勿胡为。那猴王信受奉行，即日与五斗星君到府，打开酒瓶，同众尽饮。送星官回转本宫，他才遂心满意，喜地欢天，在于天宫快乐，无挂无碍。正是：
畢竟不知向後如何，且聽下回分解。毕竟不知向后如何，且听下回分解。
逐句解 Line by line
Wukong, greatly pleased, would not be kept for the feast he was pressed to stay for, but rode the auspicious clouds with the Star-Lord out beyond the Southern Gate.
He will not even stay for his own victory party — he wants to be in Heaven now. 不肯 takes bù; 縱著祥雲 takes 著 as the running zhe.
The heavenly troops and generals all raised clasped hands to welcome them.
天將 takes 將 as jiàng. These are the same gate-guards who blocked him in the opening scene and fought him in the middle of the chapter. Now they raise clasped hands in welcome. Nothing about him has changed except the paperwork.
They went straight in below the Hall of Miraculous Mist.
徑入 is to go straight in — the very directness the gate-guards were barring a few thousand characters ago. Six characters carry him from the gate to the floor of the throne hall.
The Star-Lord bowed and reported, "By command your servant has summoned the Bìmǎwēn, Sun Wukong, who has now arrived."
The envoy's formal announcement of arrival. Note the title he is still announced under: Bìmǎwēn.
The Jade Emperor said, "Come forward, Sun Wukong. Today We proclaim you a Great Sage Equal to Heaven — your rank is of the highest. But on no account misbehave."
官品極矣, "your rank is of the highest" — the grandeur handed over in full, with a warning attached: 切不可胡為, "on no account misbehave." 那孫悟空 takes 那 as the pointing nà; 不可 takes bù; 胡為 takes 為 as wéi.
The monkey merely made a salute up toward the throne and uttered a "We thank you for your grace."
Even now he will not kneel. 唱個喏 is the standing, spoken salute again, and 喏 is rě in this use, not the nuò of assent. The 亦止, "merely," is the narrator's own dry comment on how much this ceremony has humbled him. 朝上 takes 朝 as cháo.
The Jade Emperor then ordered the works-officers, the two guilds of Zhang and Lu, to raise — to the right of the Peach Garden — an Equal-to-Heaven Great Sage Mansion, and within the mansion to set up two offices: one called the Office of Tranquility, one the Office of Calmed Spirit.
The empty title is given a building. A 齊天大聖府 goes up beside the Peach Garden, staffed with two bureaus whose names give the whole game away: 安靜司, the Office of Tranquillity, and 寧神司, the Office of Calmed Spirit. Their job description is their job. And note the address — putting a bored, unsupervised Monkey King next door to the fruit of immortality is the setup for the entire next chapter. 工幹官 takes 幹 as gàn; 一座 takes yí and 一名 takes yì.
Each office had its immortal clerks, attending left and right.
左右扶持 staffs the empty office with attendants who have nothing to attend to. The sentence is written in flat administrative prose, and the joke lives entirely in the detail.
He further sent the Five-Dipper Star-Lords to escort Wukong to his post, and bestowed besides two bottles of imperial wine and ten golden flowers, charging him to settle his heart and steady his will, and misbehave no more.
五斗星君, the Five-Dipper Star-Lords, escort him; the wine and the ten golden flowers are the sweeteners; and the charge to 安心定志, "settle the heart and steady the will," is the policy stated as a gift-tag. 又差 takes 差 as chāi; 著他 is causative zhuó; 胡為 takes 為 as wéi.
The Monkey King received and obeyed it all, and that very day went to his mansion with the Five-Dipper Star-Lords, opened the wine-bottles, and drank his fill with the company.
信受奉行, "received it in faith and put it into practice," is the formula that closes a Chinese Buddhist sūtra — the congregation's obedient assent. Applying it to a monkey opening the wine bottles is a joke delivered with a straight face. 那猴王 takes 那 as nà.
He saw the Star-Lords back to their own palaces, and only then, his heart content and his wishes full, joyful as earth and glad as heaven, he took his ease in the Heavenly Palace, free of all cares and hindrances. Thus it is that:
Three set phrases of contentment in a row: 遂心滿意, wishes met; 喜地歡天, the everyday 歡天喜地 turned around for the rhythm; and 無掛無礙, free of snags and obstructions, which echoes the Heart Sutra's 心無罣礙. The monkey is perfectly happy, and perfectly wrong. 快樂 takes 樂 as lè; 正是 is the storyteller cueing the closing couplet.
His immortal name is forever entered in the Register of Long Life,
長生籙, the Register of Long Life — 長 is cháng — the celestial roll of the deathless. This couplet names the one thing he has genuinely won, and it is not the title.
no more to fall in the wheel of rebirth, passed down through all the ages.
不墮輪迴, "no more to fall into the wheel of rebirth"; 不墮 takes bú before the falling tone of 墮, and 傳 is chuán. Escape from the wheel of rebirth (saṃsāra) is a Buddhist idea sitting directly beside a Daoist register of immortals — two systems in one couplet, which is the ordinary weather of this novel.
After all, there is no knowing what is to come hereafter; listen to the next chapter told.
畢竟不知向後如何，且聽下回分解 — the storyteller's invariable sign-off, and still the stock Chinese phrase for "to be continued." 不知 takes bù.
The chapter ends exactly as its title promised — 名注齊天意未寧, the name enrolled, the will still unquiet. Wukong is invested as 齊天大聖 with every mark of honour: highest rank, a mansion beside the Peach Garden, immortal clerks, imperial wine, ten golden flowers. The generosity is the trap closing. The two bureaus set up inside his mansion give it away in their names — 安靜司 and 寧神司, the Office of Tranquillity and the Office of Calmed Spirit. Heaven has not honoured him. It has assigned him a gilded quiet.
The dramatic irony is complete and beautifully weighted. Wukong leaves 遂心滿意, heart content and wishes full, taking his ease 無掛無礙, certain he has wrung recognition out of Heaven by force of arms. What he has actually accepted is the hollow honour designed to neuter him, and the Emperor's parting words — 切不可胡為, "on no account misbehave" — hang over all that contentment like a lit fuse. Siting the mansion next to the 蟠桃園, the Peach Garden, is the storyteller's wink to anyone who knows what an idle Monkey King does when left unsupervised beside the fruit of immortality.
The closing couplet lifts the scene out of comedy and states the real stakes. Underneath the empty title lies something he has genuinely acquired: 仙名永注長生籙，不墮輪迴萬古傳 — his name is fixed in the Register of Long Life, beyond the wheel of rebirth. For the inner-alchemical reader this is the knot the whole 齊天 episode has been tying. The 心猿 has secured immortality — but immortality without cultivation, deathlessness in a heart still unrefined and unstilled, is precisely the dangerous condition the rest of the saga has to resolve. An undisciplined power that can no longer die is not a triumph; it is a problem postponed. The chapter closes on a peace that everyone except Wukong understands to be temporary.