誇頭遭傷 The Head That Nothing Could Harm
八戒笑道：「只這等靜處常誇口，說你的頭是修煉過的。卻怎麼就不禁這一下扎？」行者道：「正是。我這頭，自從修煉成真，盜食了蟠桃仙酒、老子金丹，大鬧天宮時，又被玉帝差大力鬼王、二十八宿，押赴斗牛宮處處斬，那些神將使刀斧鎚劍，雷打火燒；及老子把我安於八卦爐，煅煉四十九日：俱未傷損。今日不知這婦人用的是甚麼兵器，把老孫頭弄傷也。」沙僧道：「你放了手，等我看看，莫破了？」行者道：「不破，不破。」八戒道：「我去西梁國討個膏藥你貼貼。」行者道：「又不瘇不破，怎麼貼得膏藥？」八戒笑道：「哥啊，我的胎前產後病倒不曾有，你倒弄了個腦門癰了。」八戒笑道：「只这等静处常夸口，说你的头是修炼过的。却怎么就不禁这一下扎？」行者道：「正是。我这头，自从修炼成真，盗食了蟠桃仙酒、老子金丹，大闹天宫时，又被玉帝差大力鬼王、二十八宿，押赴斗牛宫处处斩，那些神将使刀斧锤剑，雷打火烧；及老子把我安于八卦炉，煅炼四十九日：俱未伤损。今日不知这妇人用的是甚么兵器，把老孙头弄伤也。」沙僧道：「你放了手，等我看看，莫破了？」行者道：「不破，不破。」八戒道：「我去西梁国讨个膏药你贴贴。」行者道：「又不瘇不破，怎么贴得膏药？」八戒笑道：「哥啊，我的胎前产后病倒不曾有，你倒弄了个脑门痈了。」
逐句解 Line by line
Bajie said with a laugh, “In quiet times like this you are forever boasting, and telling us that head of yours has been through the refining.
靜處 takes 處 as chù. 修煉過的 refers to the alchemical hardening of the body that Pilgrim went through before his rebellion in heaven — the reason he is normally unbreakable.
“How comes it, then, that it cannot bear a single jab?”
不禁 takes 禁 as jīn, to bear — the same reading as 難禁 in the passage above. The 不 stays bù, 禁 being first tone.
Pilgrim said, “Just so. This head of mine — ever since I refined myself to the true state, and stole and ate the peaches of immortality, the wine of the immortals and Laozi’s golden elixir, and made havoc in Heaven — the Jade Emperor sent the Demon King of Great Strength and the Twenty-Eight Constellations to haul me off to the Palace of the Dipper and the Ox and behead me there in one place after another; and those divine generals used knife and axe, hammer and sword, and struck me with thunder and burned me with fire;
差 is chāi, to send someone on official business; the chà that means "to differ" would be wrong. 二十八宿 takes 宿 as xiù, the twenty-eight lunar mansions — the constellations along the moon's path, each with an animal attached. That detail will matter enormously later. 斗牛宮 takes 斗 as dǒu, the Dipper, not the dòu of combat. 老子 takes 子 as the full zǐ, being a name. 神將 takes 將 as the rank jiàng, a general — the character is a head noun here, not the handling word jiāng.
“and when Laozi set me inside his eight-trigram brazier and smelted me there for nine and forty days — none of it did me the least harm.
老子 again takes zǐ. The 八卦爐 is the furnace of the eight trigrams, and forty-nine days is the standard alchemical stretch.
“And today I cannot tell what weapon this woman used, but she has contrived to do old Monkey’s head an injury with it.”
甚麼 takes 甚 as shén. The admission closes the catalogue: everything heaven could throw at him failed, and one unnamed implement has succeeded.
Sha Monk said, “Take your hand away and let me look at it. Surely it is not broken open?”
看看 doubles the verb to make it casual — "let's have a look" — and takes kàn both times, against the kān of 看守 earlier.
Pilgrim said, “Not broken, not broken.”
Both 不 stand before 破, fourth tone, and take bú automatically.
Bajie said, “I shall go to the Kingdom of Western Liang and beg a plaster for you to stick on it.”
The proposal is comic in its scale: a journey back to the kingdom they have only just escaped, in order to fetch a sticking-plaster.
Pilgrim said, “It is neither swollen nor broken — how should a plaster stick to it?”
貼得 is the "can't manage to" construction and takes 得 as the toneless de. 瘇 is a variant way of writing the character for swelling, kept as the edition prints it. 不瘇 takes bù before a third tone, 不破 takes bú before a fourth.
Bajie said with a laugh, “Brother, I never did come down with the complaints of before and after childbirth — and here are you with a carbuncle on the crown of your head.”
Both 倒 are the "and yet" adversative dào, not the dǎo, "to topple", that the same character carries in the demon's weapon-name. 胎前產後病 — the complaints of before and after childbirth — looks back to the water of the Motherhood River and the pregnancy it brought on. 癰 is a deep-seated abscess, a carbuncle.
Pilgrim's catalogue is a compressed replay of the novel's opening chapters, delivered as an epic boast of the oldest kind: the hero recites the list of things that have failed to kill him. The Jade Emperor's warrant, the Demon King of Great Strength, the twenty-eight lunar mansions, the beheadings attempted 處處, in place after place, the knife and axe and hammer and sword, the thunder and the fire, and finally forty-nine days in Laozi's furnace — and the summary of the whole list is 俱未傷損, none of it did the least harm.
The boast exists in order to be refuted, and it is refuted in the very next breath by one clause: today he cannot say what the woman used, and it has hurt him. This is a structural point, not a joke. The powers Pilgrim won in heaven are proof against everything heaven can do, which turns out to be a much narrower guarantee than it sounds. The road west keeps producing dangers that were never on the celestial inventory, and this is the plainest statement of that principle in the book.
Bajie has the last word and reduces the whole business to household medicine. He offers to walk back to the kingdom they have just fled for a sticking-plaster, and when that is refused he points out that he himself came through the Motherhood River affair — the pregnancy of an earlier chapter — without so much as a sniffle, whereas his brother has managed to acquire a boil on the crown of his head. It is a good joke, and like most of Bajie's jokes it is also an accurate summary: the invulnerable one is the one who is hurt.