男身有孕 Male Bodies with Child
三藏聞言，大驚失色道：「徒弟啊，似此怎了？」八戒扭腰撒胯的哼道：「爺爺呀！要生孩子，我們卻是男身，那裡開得產門？如何脫得出來？」行者笑道：「古人云：『瓜熟自落。』若到那個時節，一定從脅下裂個窟窿，鑽出來也。」八戒見說，戰兢兢，忍不得疼痛道：「罷了，罷了，死了，死了。」沙僧笑道：「二哥莫扭，莫扭，只怕錯了養兒腸，弄做個胎前病。」那獃子越發慌了，眼中噙淚，扯著行者道：「哥哥，你問這婆婆，看那裡有手輕的穩婆，預先尋下幾個。這半會一陣陣的動蕩得緊，想是摧陣疼，快了，快了。」沙僧又笑道：「二哥既知摧陣疼，不要扭動，只恐擠破漿包耳。」三藏闻言，大惊失色道：「徒弟啊，似此怎了？」八戒扭腰撒胯的哼道：「爷爷呀！要生孩子，我们却是男身，那里开得产门？如何脱得出来？」行者笑道：「古人云：『瓜熟自落。』若到那个时节，一定从胁下裂个窟窿，钻出来也。」八戒见说，战兢兢，忍不得疼痛道：「罢了，罢了，死了，死了。」沙僧笑道：「二哥莫扭，莫扭，只怕错了养儿肠，弄做个胎前病。」那呆子越发慌了，眼中噙泪，扯着行者道：「哥哥，你问这婆婆，看那里有手轻的稳婆，预先寻下几个。这半会一阵阵的动荡得紧，想是摧阵疼，快了，快了。」沙僧又笑道：「二哥既知摧阵疼，不要扭动，只恐挤破浆包耳。」
逐句解 Line by line
Tripitaka, hearing this, went pale with shock and said, "Disciple! What is to be done about such a thing as this?"
怎了 takes 了 as liǎo, to settle or finish — how is this to end? — and not the light le that marks a completed action. 似 is sì.
Eight Rules, writhing at the waist and spreading his hips, groaned, "Gracious sir! If we are to bear children — but we are male in body. Where should we open a birth passage? How is the thing to get out?"
那裡 is nǎ, the rhetorical where, and both 得 ask whether the thing can be done, so both are the light de. The question is crude and entirely reasonable, and nobody in the passage has an answer to it.
Pilgrim said with a laugh, "The ancients say: when the melon is ripe it drops of itself."
瓜熟自落 — when the melon is ripe it drops of itself — is a proverb about natural inevitability, normally used to tell somebody to stop fretting about a thing that will sort itself out in its own time. Applied to this situation it is monstrous, which is exactly why Wukong is laughing as he says it.
"When that time comes, a hole will surely split open under your ribs, and out it will crawl."
從脅下, from beneath the ribs, is not invented cruelty. Birth from the side is the traditional account of the Buddha's own nativity from Queen Māyā, and Wukong is picking up a piece of received sacred biography and using it to frighten his brother.
Eight Rules, hearing it, was all a-tremble, and unable to bear the pain said, "Done for, done for! Dead, dead!"
罷了 here is not the soft closing ba of a suggestion but the verb bà, to have done — it is over, we are finished. 忍不得 asks whether the pain can be borne.
Sha Monk said, laughing, "Second brother, stop writhing, stop writhing — you'll only get the birth-canal out of place and turn it into an antenatal complaint."
養兒腸 takes 兒 as ér, the full word child. 胎前病 is real obstetric vocabulary, and Sha Monk's deadpan use of it is the joke: he is offering clinically sound advice about a condition his brother cannot possibly have.
The idiot grew more frantic still, tears standing in his eyes, and tugged at Pilgrim: "Brother, ask this grandmother where there is a midwife with a light touch, and find a few of them beforehand.
Two 那 in one sentence with different readings — nà, that, in 那獃子, and nǎ, where, in 那裡. 手輕的穩婆, a midwife with a light touch, is the request of a man who has stopped arguing and started planning.
This little while it has been heaving and stirring, fit after fit, and hard — I think these are the bearing-down pains. It is coming, it is coming!"
摧陣疼 is the labour pain that comes in waves — what English calls bearing-down pains. Bajie has by now acquired the complete technical vocabulary of childbirth, which he did not have four segments ago, and the speed of the acquisition is half the joke.
Sha Monk said, laughing again, "Second brother, if you know they are the bearing-down pains, then don't wriggle about — you may burst the waters."
漿包 is the amniotic sac; bursting it is what English calls the waters breaking. 耳 ends the sentence with a light literary flourish meaning that is all, and it gives Sha Monk's second warning the same dry finish as his first.
This is the chapter's comic set-piece, and it works by taking its own premise entirely seriously. Bajie asks the only question that matters — men have no birth passage, so by what route is the child supposed to leave? — and the novel neither laughs the question off nor answers it. What it does instead is let three characters respond in the only three ways available to them.
Wukong answers with a proverb and then with a picture. 瓜熟自落, the ripe melon falling of itself, is ordinary consoling wisdom about letting things take their course; used here it is calculated cruelty, and he follows it by specifying that a hole will open under the ribs. The detail is not arbitrary. Birth from the mother's side is the traditional account of the Buddha's own nativity, and Wukong is using a solemn piece of sacred biography to terrify his brother. The novel's habit of putting holy material to unholy use is rarely this compact.
Sha Monk's contribution is funnier and stranger. Twice he offers advice that is clinically correct — do not writhe, you will displace the birth canal; do not struggle, you will rupture the sac — in language that is accurate obstetrics throughout. 養兒腸, 胎前病, 摧陣疼 and 漿包 are not comic inventions. They are the real terms. The humour comes from their perfect deployment on a patient to whom none of them can apply, delivered by the least excitable member of the party.
Bajie's own trajectory across the passage is the best joke in it. He begins by objecting that he is male and ends by asking for midwives to be engaged in advance and reporting his contractions. Somewhere in between he stopped disputing the premise and started managing the delivery, and he picked up the vocabulary to do it. Nobody remarks on the shift.