立地渴死 I Would Sooner Die of Thirst
那師父獨鍊自熬，困苦太甚。正在愴惶之際，忽聽得一聲響亮，諕得長老欠身看處，原來是孫行者跪在路傍，雙手捧著一個磁杯道：「師父，沒有老孫，你連水也不能夠哩。這一杯好涼水，你且吃口水解渴，待我再去化齋。」長老道：「我不吃你的水，立地渴死，我當任命。不要你了，你去罷。」行者道：「無我你去不得西天也。」三藏道：「去得去不得，不干你事。潑猢猻，只管來纏我做甚？」那师父独炼自熬，困苦太甚。正在怆惶之际，忽听得一声响亮，諕得长老欠身看处，原来是孙行者跪在路傍，双手捧着一个磁杯道：「师父，没有老孙，你连水也不能够哩。这一杯好凉水，你且吃口水解渴，待我再去化斋。」长老道：「我不吃你的水，立地渴死，我当任命。不要你了，你去罢。」行者道：「无我你去不得西天也。」三藏道：「去得去不得，不干你事。泼猢狲，只管来缠我做甚？」
逐句解 Line by line
That master of theirs, left to smelt and stew alone, was in extremity of misery.
獨鍊自熬 borrows the alchemist's furnace for an old man's misery -- 鍊 is to refine by fire and 熬 is to boil down -- which picks the vocabulary of the poem straight back up. 太甚 takes 甚 as the intensifier, shèn, against the question word shén of 做甚 at the end of this same passage.
Just at the height of his distress he suddenly heard a loud noise, and the elder, startled, raised himself to look — and there was Sun Pilgrim, kneeling by the roadside, holding up a porcelain cup in both hands and saying: “Master, without Old Monkey you cannot come by so much as water.
The impostor arrives, and the text does not warn you. 得 appears twice with different readings: 聽得 is attainment, dé, while 諕得 is the linking de that hangs a consequence off a verb -- startled to the point of sitting up. 諕 is fixed at xià, against the háo an automatic reading supplies. 看處 takes 處 as a moment rather than a place, chù. 捧著 is 著 marking the cup held up and kept held, zhe. And note what the narrator says: 原來是孫行者, there was Sun Pilgrim -- flatly, as a fact.
“Here is a fine cup of cool water. Drink a mouthful and quench your thirst, and let me go off again and beg you some food.”
好涼水 takes 好 as the exclamation, hǎo, not the hào of being fond of something. This character carries no automatic guard and the two readings are easy to confuse, so every occurrence in the chapter is checked by hand.
The elder said: “I will not drink your water. I will die of thirst where I stand, and I shall take that as my lot. I want no more of you. Go away.”
He refuses water from a kneeling man. 你去罷 takes 罷 as the soft sentence-ending, ba, against the full verb bà of 罷罷罷 in the chapter's opening lines. 我當任命 takes 當 as "shall, ought to", dāng -- I shall take it as my lot.
Pilgrim said: “Without me you will never reach the Western Heaven.”
Listen to this line carefully. It is almost word for word what the real Wukong said back at the roadside -- 只怕你無我去不得西天 -- and it takes the same reading of 去不得, the negative can't-do frame with the light de. The impostor has the phrasing exactly right.
Tripitaka said: “Whether I get there or not is no concern of yours.
And so does Tripitaka, who gives back the identical sentence he gave the first time: 我去得去不得, 不干你事. It takes the same handling of 不干 -- 干 is held at gān, a first tone, so 不 stays bù where the automatic tone-raising rule would have lifted it. This is the second time the construction appears in the chapter.
“You wretched baboon, what do you mean by coming to pester me all the time?”
做甚 takes the question word 甚 at shén, against the intensifier shèn of 太甚 at the head of this passage -- both readings inside about a hundred and thirty characters.
The scene is built out of repetition, and the repetition is the horror of it. Everything the kneeling figure says has been said before by the real Wukong, and everything Tripitaka answers he has already answered once: without me you cannot reach the West, and whether I get there is no concern of yours. The exchange from the chapter's second passage is played through again, almost word for word, with one of the two speakers swapped out.
The text gives no warning at all. It says 原來是孫行者 -- there was Sun Pilgrim -- with the same flat certainty it uses everywhere else, and the reader has exactly one thing to set against it: the Bodhisattva has just made Wukong stay at Potalaka. That knowledge, planted two passages back and never mentioned again, is the whole of the reader's advantage.
Tripitaka's refusal is worse than his earlier one. He is not defending a principle about killing now; he is refusing water from a kneeling man who is offering it, and he refuses twice, and calls him a baboon. Whatever the figure on the road turns out to be, the old man's conduct toward it is the same conduct he has shown all chapter.