詐言尋親 A Feigned Search for Kin
行者聞言，扯住道士滴淚道：「我說我無緣，真個無緣，不得見老師父尊面。」道士云：「如何不得見面？」行者道：「我貧道在方上雲遊，一則是為性命，二則也為尋親。」道士問：「你有甚麼親？」行者道：「我有一個叔父，自幼出家，削髮為僧。向日年程饑饉，也來外面求乞。這幾年不見回家，我念祖上之恩，特來順便尋訪。想必是羈遲在此等地方，不能脫身，未可知也。我怎的尋著他，見一面，才可與你進城。」行者闻言，扯住道士滴泪道：「我说我无缘，真个无缘，不得见老师父尊面。」道士云：「如何不得见面？」行者道：「我贫道在方上云游，一则是为性命，二则也为寻亲。」道士问：「你有甚么亲？」行者道：「我有一个叔父，自幼出家，削发为僧。向日年程饥馑，也来外面求乞。这几年不见回家，我念祖上之恩，特来顺便寻访。想必是羁迟在此等地方，不能脱身，未可知也。我怎的寻着他，见一面，才可与你进城。」
逐句解 Line by line
Pilgrim, hearing this, caught hold of the Daoist and, letting fall tears, said: "I said I had no luck — truly, no luck — that I should not get to see the old masters' honored faces."
He bursts into tears on cue. The performance is calculated — a wandering Daoist who weeps at not meeting the masters is a wandering Daoist nobody suspects of anything. 得 is full dé, to get to see; 不 is bù in front of it.
The Daoist said: "Why should you not get to see them?"
得 is dé again, the same "get to."
Pilgrim said: "This poor Daoist roams the regions, for one thing for my life's sake, and for another to seek a kinsman."
He recycles his own earlier formula. Two passages back he pleaded 一則 … 二則, "for one thing young, for another newly arrived"; now it is "for one thing my life, for another my kin." Reusing the trick is what makes the persona feel worn-in. 一 keeps its counting yī; 為 is wèi, for the sake of.
The Daoist asked: "What kinsman have you?"
甚 is shén, "what."
Pilgrim said: "I had an uncle who left the household from his youth, shaved his head, and became a monk.
The invented uncle is fitted precisely to the sand-flat in front of them: a boy who left home young and shaved his head. 為 is wéi, to become.
In a lean year of famine long ago he too went out to beg abroad.
向日, in former days. 饑饉 is famine — strictly, a failure of the grain harvest and of the vegetable crop together, which is why two characters are needed.
These several years he has not come home, and I, mindful of my forebears' kindness, have come on purpose — as my road allowed — to seek him out.
順便, "as the road allowed," in passing — the small touch that makes the lie sound like a real errand rather than a quest. 不 is bú before 見.
It may well be that he is detained in some such place as this, unable to get free — there is no telling.
羈遲, held up, detained somewhere against one's will — and he says it while looking at five hundred men who are. 不 is bù before 能.
How shall I find him and get one sight of him? Only then can I go into the city with you."
The whole performance has been aimed at this sentence: let me walk among them, and then I will come with you. 著 in 尋著 is zháo, the hitting-the-mark reading — to search and actually find. 一 is yí before 面.
Wukong extends the cover with a small performance of grief and an invented family tree: an uncle who took the tonsure as a boy, went out begging in a famine year, and never came home. The story is cut to fit the scene in front of them, and that is what makes it good.
It also does two jobs at once. It gives him a reason to walk among the monks, and it flatters the Daoists' sense of their own generosity, since a Daoist looking for a lost Buddhist relative is nobody's idea of a threat. The 一則 … 二則 framing is lifted straight from his own earlier speech to the same two men — a persona is more convincing when it repeats itself.