Canonical Classics ← 第七十四回
第七十四回
chánggēngchuánbàotóuhěn
xíngzhěshīwéibiànhuànéng

Long Geng Brings Word of a Fierce Demon Chief · Pilgrim Works His Powers of Transformation

不知好歹
模式 Mode Read Study
拼音 Pinyin Off
字體 Script
原文 Original text 繁體 Traditional Reader's edition

不知好歹 You Do Not Know Better

lǎoérxiàodào:「zhèxiǎoshàngniányòuzhīhǎodǎiyánbāngchènyāoshéntōngguǎngdejǐnzěngǎnjiùshuōbiǎnjièshēn?」lǎoérxiàodào:「zhèxiǎoshàngniányòuzhīhǎodǎiyánbāngchènyāoshéntōng广guǎngdejǐnzěngǎnjiùshuōbiǎnjièshēn?」


逐句解 Line by line

lǎoérxiàodào:「zhèxiǎoshàngniányòuzhīhǎodǎiyánbāngchèn lǎoérxiàodào:「zhèxiǎoshàngniányòuzhīhǎodǎiyánbāngchèn

The old fellow laughed. "You are a young little monk who cannot tell good from bad, and your talk does you no good at all.

不知好歹 is still current and still an insult — not knowing what is good for you, unable to tell a kindness from an injury. 幫襯 is a fine old word for backing somebody up: is the lining of a garment, the layer underneath that holds the shape, so to 幫襯 somebody is to be that for them. 言不幫襯 therefore means roughly that your words are doing nothing to hold you up.

yāoshéntōngguǎngdejǐnzěngǎnjiùshuōbiǎnjièshēn?」 yāoshéntōng广guǎngdejǐnzěngǎnjiùshuōbiǎnjièshēn?」

That demon's powers are enormously great. How dare you talk about banishing him and packing him off?"

神通 is a Buddhist technical term before it is a compliment: the supernatural faculties a practitioner acquires, six of them in the standard list. 得緊 is the degree complement — great, and how great? — very — with going unstressed as de, exactly as it did in 生得俊雅 a moment ago.


總評 Commentary

The old man's rebuke is aimed squarely at the disguise, which means the disguise is still working. He is not saying you are a monkey. He is saying you are a child who has no idea what he is talking about.

And he is right about the substance while being entirely wrong about the speaker. The demon's powers are enormous; talking about banishment is absurd. The one thing he cannot know is that the pretty boy in front of him is the only creature on the mountain for whom it is not absurd at all.