冤愆滿足 The Three Years Are Up
佛母懺悔以後，吩咐教他拆鳳三年，身耽啾疾。那時節，我跨著這犼，同聽此言。不期這孽畜留心，故來騙了皇后，與王消災。至今三年，冤愆滿足，幸你來救治王患。我特來收妖邪也。」佛母忏悔以后，吩咐教他拆凤三年，身耽啾疾。那时节，我跨着这犼，同听此言。不期这孽畜留心，故来骗了皇后，与王消灾。至今三年，冤愆满足，幸你来救治王患。我特来收妖邪也。」
逐句解 Line by line
"After the Buddha-Mother had made her act of contrition, she directed that he should be parted from his phoenix for three years and burdened in body with a wasting sickness.
拆鳳三年 is the sentence, and it is the same four characters the queen sang in her lament 4,603 characters ago. She was quoting her own punishment without knowing it. 教 is jiào, to order.
"At that time I was riding this hou, and it heard the words along with me.
著 is zhe, the durative — she was mounted while the sentence was pronounced, and the animal underneath her was listening.
"I did not expect the cursed beast to take note of it, and so come here, swindle the queen away, and dispel the king's calamity.
留心 is to keep a thing in mind — the whole plot of the chapter turns on an animal paying attention. 騙 is the same character Wukong used in his indictment a moment ago, and she uses it of her own mount without flinching.
"Now three years are up, the debt of wrong is discharged, and by good fortune you have come to cure the king's affliction.
冤愆 pairs a wrong suffered with a fault committed — a karmic debt with two sides. 滿足 here is not satisfaction but completion: the term has run its full length.
"I have come expressly to take back the evil creature."
Seven characters to close. 收 again — to gather in, reclaim — the same word she used when she first said why she was here.
The sentence was pronounced by the wronged party herself. The Buddha-Mother performs an act of contrition first — 懺悔, the formal Buddhist repentance — and only then hands down the penalty, which is a nice detail: even the injured party has something to atone for before she is entitled to punish.
拆鳳三年 is the quotation the whole chapter has been waiting for. The queen sang those four characters in her lament 4,603 characters ago, wondering when she would see her husband again. They are the exact words of the decree, and she has been reciting her own sentence without knowing it was one.
The mechanism is almost comic. A Bodhisattva's riding animal overhears a court judgement, waits, breaks its chain, and carries out the sentence itself by abducting the queen — which is precisely what the decree required, since parting the phoenix pair for three years is what it says. 不期 — I did not expect — is Guanyin admitting she did not see it coming.