畫了罡斗 The Dipper Drawn on the Floor
行者才教三個王子都在暴紗亭後，靜室之間，畫了罡斗。教三人都俯伏在內，一個個瞑目寧神。行者才教三个王子都在暴纱亭后，静室之间，画了罡斗。教三人都俯伏在内，一个个瞑目宁神。
逐句解 Line by line
Only then did Pilgrim have the three princes go into a quiet room behind the Gauze-Airing Pavilion, where he drew out the Dipper pattern.
罡斗 is the constellation figure a Daoist adept paces out on the ground — 斗 is dǒu, the Dipper, the seven stars of the Plough, and 罡 is the star at the end of its handle. Treading the pattern was a standard rite for drawing down power. What follows is not martial instruction at all; it is a Daoist internal-alchemy operation performed by a Buddhist pilgrim on three Indian princes.
He had all three lie face down inside it, each of them with eyes closed and spirit stilled.
瞑目寧神, closing the eyes and quieting the spirit, is the standard opening instruction of any meditation manual. The boys who wanted to learn cudgel work are lying face down on a floor with their eyes shut.
The teaching begins and it turns out not to involve weapons. It involves a diagram on a floor and three boys lying still.
The vocabulary is entirely Daoist — the Dipper pattern, the stilling of the spirit — in a chapter whose title is about Chan. This novel never separates the two traditions and has no interest in being asked to.