分頭駕雲 Two Clouds Sent Different Ways
叫:「阿儺、迦葉,來,你兩個分頭駕雲去五臺山、峨眉山,宣文殊、普賢來見。」二尊者即奉旨而去。叫:「阿傩、迦叶,来,你两个分头驾云去五台山、峨眉山,宣文殊、普贤来见。」二尊者即奉旨而去。
逐句解 Line by line
He called, "Ananda! Kasyapa! Come here. You two are to take cloud each his own way, to Mount Wutai and to Mount Emei, and summon Manjushri and Samantabhadra to appear."
Four names, all real. Ananda and Kasyapa are the Buddha's chief disciples and in this book they are his attendants. Mount Wutai in Shanxi is Manjushri's mountain and Mount Emei in Sichuan is Samantabhadra's — two of the four sacred Buddhist mountains of China, and still places of pilgrimage. 分頭 is to split up and go separately.
The two Honoured Ones went at once as they were bidden.
Eight characters. No question, no delay. The contrast with the gate guardians is sharp and probably deliberate.
The Buddha does not explain; he sends for the owners. Two disciples, two mountains, two Bodhisattvas, and Wukong is left standing there working out what it means.
The geography is worth having. Wutai and Emei are a very long way apart — north China and Sichuan — and each is the earthly seat of the Bodhisattva named. A Ming reader would know both as places you could actually walk to, which grounds the summons in the world.
And nobody asks a question. Compare the doorkeepers half an hour ago, insisting on procedure. The higher you go in this hierarchy the less anyone stands on form.