逢山開路 They Bridge the Rivers for Me
我有三個徒弟，逢山開路，遇水疊橋，保我弟子，所以到得上剎。」那和尚道：「三位高徒何在？」三藏道：「現在山門外伺候。」我有三个徒弟，逢山开路，遇水叠桥，保我弟子，所以到得上刹。」那和尚道：「三位高徒何在？」三藏道：「现在山门外伺候。」
逐句解 Line by line
I have three disciples who open a road when we meet a mountain and lay a bridge when we meet water, and guard your disciple, and that is how I have come to your monastery."
The fourth and last 剎, chà. 逢山開路 is answered by 遇水疊橋, a set pair and an old one — it belongs to the vocabulary of armies on the march before it ever belonged to pilgrims.
The monk said, "And where are your three worthy disciples?"
高徒, lofty disciples, is polite inflation: the courteous way to enquire after another man's students, whatever they turn out to look like.
Tripitaka said, "They are waiting outside the mountain gate."
Waiting outside, because he told them to. The arrangement he made two blocks ago is about to have consequences.
The phrase about opening roads and laying bridges is the most generous thing Tripitaka says about his disciples anywhere in the chapter, and it comes after an afternoon of calling one of them a wretched ape and a monkey head.
It is also true. Pilgrim cut the path into the black pine wood with an iron rod this very morning, which is the literal version of the proverb, and it took his master straight to the demon.