赤腳獻梨 The Barefoot Immortal
如來忻然領謝。壽星得座，依然走斝傳觴。只見赤腳大仙又至，向玉帝前頫顖，禮畢，又對佛祖謝道：「深感法力，降伏妖猴。無物可以表敬，特具交梨二顆、火棗數枚奉獻。」詩曰：如来忻然领谢。寿星得座，依然走斝传觞。只见赤脚大仙又至，向玉帝前俯顖，礼毕，又对佛祖谢道：「深感法力，降伏妖猴。无物可以表敬，特具交梨二颗、火枣数枚奉献。」诗曰：
逐句解 Line by line
The Tathāgata gladly accepted the thanks. The Star of Longevity took his seat, and again the wine-cups went round. Then the Barefoot Immortal arrived, bowed his head before the Jade Emperor, completed his obeisance, and turning to the Buddha gave thanks, saying:
忻然 (xīn rán) is gladly. 赤腳大仙 is Chì jiǎo dà xiān, the Barefoot Immortal — the name is the whole character. 頫顖 is an unusual pair: 頫 is fǔ, to bow the head, and 顖 is xìn, the crown of the skull, the soft spot on an infant. Together they mean lowering the crown of the head to the ground. One point for readers using the simplified toggle: 頫 converts to a different, much rarer character on that view, which some fonts may not display — the commentary explains.
"I deeply feel your Dharma-power in subduing the fiendish monkey. Having nothing worthy to show my respect, I bring only two crossed-pears and several fire-dates to present." The poem says:
降伏 keeps 降 as xiáng, to subdue. 交梨 and 火棗 (jiāo lí, huǒ zǎo), crossed-pear and fire-date, are legendary Daoist fruits that always appear as a pair — the immortals' version of bringing a bottle. The lead-in 詩曰 closes the prose.
The Barefoot Immortal's dates and pears are fragrant; reverently offered to Amitābha, that his reckoned years be long.
彌陀 is Mí tuó, Amitābha, used here as an honorific for the Buddha sitting in front of him. Strictly they are different Buddhas; the poem is not being technical. 壽算長 keeps 長 as cháng, the reckoned span long. Every gift this evening arrives with the same wish attached.
His Seven-Jewel Lotus Dais, steady as a mountain; his thousand-gold flower-throne, adorned like brocade.
七寶蓮臺 is the Seven-Jewel Lotus Dais, the Buddha's throne. The couplet praises it for being 山樣穩, steady as a mountain — and a mountain is precisely what he has just set down on the monkey. He sits as immovable as the prison he made.
His years equal to heaven and earth — the words are no falsehood; his fortune likened to the vast waves — the saying is no boast.
言非謬… 話豈狂 — no falsehood, no wild talk. The poem stops to insist that its own extravagance is plain fact, and that is not idle. Set it beside the monkey's boast-poem a few passages back (該讓我… 敢爭先), which was exactly the 狂, the wildness, that the Buddha rebuked. Praise that is true is measuring itself here against boasting that was not.
His fortune and long life fulfilled as appointed — truly it is the pure, idle, utmost bliss of that Western land.
極樂 keeps 樂 as lè: Ultimate Bliss, Sanskrit Sukhāvatī, the Western Pure Land. 那西方 takes 那 as nà, that — that Western land. The poem ends by naming the Buddha's address, and that is the last word of praise before the chapter goes back to the mountain.
The Barefoot Immortal completes the trio of great guests, bringing the legendary paired fruits of Daoist immortality, the 交梨 (crossed-pear) and 火棗 (fire-date). His gift-poem follows the established pattern: a Daoist deity praising the Buddha, who is addressed here as 彌陀 (Amitābha) and placed in 極樂 (Sukhāvatī, the Western Pure Land).
Two images in the poem rhyme quietly with the chapter's central act. The Buddha's lotus-throne is steady as a mountain (山樣穩) — and it is a mountain, the Five-Phases Mountain, that he has just set on the monkey; the rescuer sits as immovable as the prison he built. And the poem's insistence that its praises are no falsehood and no wild boast (言非謬… 話豈狂) points back by contrast to the monkey's boast-poem, whose claims were precisely the 狂 the Buddha rebuked. Praise that is true measures itself against boasting that was not.
A textual note on the simplified rendering. The source's character 頫 (fǔ, to bow the head, in 頫顖) is an entirely ordinary character in the traditional text. But the standard traditional-to-simplified conversion maps it, every time, to 𫖯, a much rarer character that some fonts do not carry. The mapping round-trips cleanly, and our policy is to encode what the conversion genuinely produces rather than substitute a look-alike. The simplified view may therefore show this one word as a blank box on some devices; the traditional view is unaffected.