Squire Kou, brought back from the dead, once more put his banners and streamers in order, his drums and music, his monks and Daoists and kinsmen and friends, and saw the pilgrims off exactly as he had done before. Of that, no more.
The Tang monk and his three took to the highroad, and the Buddha-land of the West was indeed unlike any other country. They saw rare blossoms and jasper grasses, ancient cypress and hoary pine; in every district they passed through, house by house the people were turned to goodness and door by door they set out food for monks; at the foot of every hill they came upon someone at his practice, and among the trees they saw travellers reciting the scriptures.
Master and disciples lodged by night and set out at dawn, and when another six or seven days had passed they suddenly saw a range of high towers and several tiers of soaring pavilions. And truly it was:
A hundred chǐ thrusting at the sky,
rearing to the River of Heaven, riding upon air.
Bow the head, and watch the sun go down;
put out the hand, and pick the flying stars.
Wide-flung casements and galleries swallow all space and time;
craggy ridgepoles and eaves come up against the screen of cloud.
The yellow crane brings word, and the autumn trees grow old;
the painted luan carries letters, and the evening wind is clear.
This, then, is a palace of spirits and a gate-tower of treasure,
a lodge of fine jade and a courtyard of pearl.
In the hall of truth they discourse upon the Way;
through all space and time they hand the scriptures down.
The flowers turn to the spring and are fair;
the pines stand out the rain and come away green.
Purple fungus and the fruit of the immortals put out their best year upon year;
the cinnabar phoenix wheels in stately measure, and ten thousand things feel its power.
Tripitaka lifted his whip, pointed away into the distance and said, “Wukong — what a fine place that is!”
Monkey said, “Master — at those false realms, at those false images of the Buddha, you would insist upon getting down and bowing; and today, arrived at the true realm and the true image of the Buddha, you still do not come off your horse. How do you account for that?”
At these words Tripitaka was so flustered that he swung himself round and sprang down; and by then they had come to the gate of the towers.
They saw a Daoist boy standing at an angle before the mountain gate, who called out to them, “Would those who come there be the scripture-seekers from the Land of the East?”
The Elder hastily set his robe straight and raised his head to look. And this is what he saw:
Brocade upon his back,
a jade whisk swinging in his hand.
Brocade upon his back —
and often he goes to the banquets of the jewelled pavilions and the Jasper Pool;
a jade whisk swinging in his hand —
and always he flicks the dust away in the cinnabar terraces and purple courts.
At his elbow hang the immortals' registers,
on his feet are sandals and shoes.
Lightly he moves, a true feathered gentleman;
handsome indeed, and truly a wonder.
He has refined long life to its finish and dwells in the finest of places;
he has cultivated everlasting years and shaken off the dust of the world.
The holy monk does not know this guest of the Spirit Mountain:
here comes the Golden-Crowned Great Immortal of that year gone by.
The Great Sage Sun knew him, and called out at once, “Master — this is the Golden-Crowned Great Immortal of the Jade-Truth Abbey at the foot of the Spirit Mountain. He has come out to meet us.” Only then did Tripitaka understand, and he went forward and made his bow.
The Great Immortal said with a laugh, “Holy monk, you have only got here this year. Guanyin has had me on. Ten years ago she took the Buddha's golden decree and went east to look for a scripture-seeker, and she said at the time it would be two or three years before he reached me. Year after year I have waited, and not a word of news; and now, past all expectation, we meet only this year.”
Tripitaka pressed his palms together. “You have gone to great trouble, Great Immortal, and shown us much kindness. I am grateful, grateful.”
So the four of them led the horse and shouldered the loads and went into the abbey together, and each was presented to the Great Immortal in turn. He gave orders at once for tea to be seen to and a meatless meal set out, and called the little boy to heat scented water for the holy monk to bathe in, the better to set foot on the Buddha's ground. And this is how it was:
The merit full and the practice finished, it is fitting to bathe;
the original nature refined and tamed, it accords with heaven's own truth.
A thousand bitternesses and ten thousand hardships only now come to rest;
the nine prohibitions and the threefold refuge begin the making new.
The demons all done with, they truly set foot on the Buddha's ground;
the calamities spent, they therefore come to see the gate of the faith.
The dust washed and the filth cleansed, wholly without stain;
turned back to the root and reverted to the source, a body that will not decay.
Master and disciples bathed, and before they knew it the sky was growing late, so they took their rest at the Jade-Truth Abbey.
Next morning the Tang monk changed his clothes, put on the brocade cassock, set the Vairocana cap on his head, took up the ringed staff, and went up into the hall to take his leave. The Great Immortal said with a laugh, “Yesterday in rags, today in splendour — looking at you now, you are truly a son of the Buddha.” Tripitaka bowed his farewell and made to set off. “Wait a moment,” said the Great Immortal. “Let me see you off.”
“No need to see us off,” said Monkey. “Old Monkey knows the way.”
“What you know is the cloud road,” said the Great Immortal. “The holy monk has not yet mounted the cloud road; he must go by the road itself.”
“That is well said. Old Monkey has been this way a few times, but it was always coming and going by cloud. I have truly never set foot on this ground. Since there is a road proper, I must trouble you to see us along it. My master's heart is set hard on worshipping the Buddha. Please do not delay.”
The Great Immortal, smiling and humming, took the Tang monk by the hand and led the Sandalwood one up to the gate of the law. As it turned out, this road did not go out by the mountain gate at all: it started from the middle hall of the abbey itself, and you came out through the back door. He pointed to the Spirit Mountain. “Holy monk — look up there in the middle sky, where the lucky light shows in five colours and the auspicious haze lies in a thousand layers. That is the high peak of the Vulture, the Buddha's own holy ground.” The Tang monk saw it, and bowed at once.
Monkey said with a laugh, “Master, we are not at the bowing place yet. As the old saying has it: look at the mountain and you will ride the horse into the ground. It is still a good way from here. Why bow already? If you were to bow all the way to the top, how many knocks of the head would that take?”
“Holy monk,” said the Great Immortal, “you and the Great Sage, Tianpeng and the Curtain-Raiser, all four of you, have reached the blessed ground and can see the Spirit Mountain. I shall go back now.” So Tripitaka bowed his farewell and went on.
The Great Sage led the Tang monk and the rest, and at a slow and easy pace they climbed the Spirit Mountain. Not five or six lǐ along they came upon a run of living water, roaring and rushing, its waves rolling and its current flying, some eight or nine lǐ across, and not a footprint anywhere about it.
Tripitaka took fright. “Wukong — this road has come out wrong. Can the Great Immortal have pointed us astray? The water is this wide and this violent, and there is no boat or oar in sight. How is it to be crossed?”
“Nothing is wrong,” said Monkey, laughing. “Look over that way — is that not a great bridge? You must go across by that bridge; only then do you win the true fruit.”
The Elder and the others went closer and looked. At the bridge stood a board, and on the board were three characters: Cloud-Touching Crossing. It was, in fact, a bridge made of a single log. And this is how it was:
Seen from afar it lies across the sky like a beam of jade;
seen from close at hand it cuts the water, one withered branch.
To bridge a river or span a sea would still be easier than this;
one log, one beam — how is a man to set his foot on it?
Ten thousand zhàng of rainbow lying flat, and its shadow with it;
a thousand xún of white silk reaching to the sky's edge.
Thin and slippery through and through, and hard past bearing to cross;
unless you are an immortal, treading the coloured clouds.
Tripitaka, trembling with fright, said, “Wukong — that bridge is not for people to walk on. Let us go and look for another way round.”
“This is the road,” said Monkey. “This is the road.”
Pigsy panicked. “This is a road? Who would dare walk it? The water is wide and the waves are up, and there is only one bare log, and it is thin and it is slippery. How is a foot to move on it?”
“All of you stand still,” said Monkey. “Let old Monkey walk it for you to see.”
Fine Great Sage — he drew his stride open, sprang up onto the single-log bridge, went swinging and swaying along it, and in a moment had run across; and from the far side he called, “Come over! Come over!” The Tang monk waved his hand. Pigsy and Sha Monk bit their fingers and said, “Hard, hard, hard.”
Monkey ran back over and took hold of Pigsy. “Idiot — come with me, come with me.” Pigsy threw himself flat on the ground. “Slippery, slippery, slippery! I can't walk it. Let me off — let me go over by wind and mist.”
Monkey held him down. “What sort of place do you think this is, that you should be allowed to travel by wind and mist? You must go across by this bridge; only then can you become a Buddha.”
“Brother,” said Pigsy, “if I can't make a Buddha of myself, then so be it. I truly cannot walk it.”
The two of them fell to tugging and hauling at each other by the bridge in a scuffling sort of play, and it was only when Sha Monk went over to part them that they let go.
Tripitaka turned his head, and all at once saw, away downstream, a man poling a boat towards them and calling, “Ferry over! Ferry over!”
The Elder was delighted. “Disciples — stop your fooling about. There's a ferry-boat coming over there.”
The three of them jumped up and stood still, and looked with one accord; and as the boat came very near, it turned out to be a boat with no bottom. Monkey, with his fiery eyes and golden pupils, had known him at once for the Buddha Who Receives and Leads, also called Namo Jewelled-Banner Radiant King Buddha — but he did not let on. He only kept calling, “Over here! Pole her in!” In an instant it was poled in close to the bank, and again the call came: “Ferry over! Ferry over!”
Tripitaka saw it and took fright again. “How is this broken bottomless boat of yours to ferry anybody across?”
The Buddha said, “This boat of mine:”
Since the first parting of the primal murk it has had a name;
and by good fortune I have poled it here, unaltered.
Waves may come and wind may come, and still she rides steady;
without end and without beginning, she takes her ease in the peace.
Unstained by the six dusts, she can return to the One;
through ten thousand ages she goes untroubled and at her ease.
A bottomless boat is a hard thing to cross the sea in —
yet from now back to antiquity she has ferried the whole living crowd.
The Great Sage Sun pressed his palms together in thanks. “You are very good. Receive and lead my master across. — Master, get in the boat. This boat of his has no bottom, but she is steady all the same, and even if wind and waves come she cannot be overturned.”
The Elder was still hanging back in doubt — so Monkey got him under the arms and gave him a shove. The Master could not keep his footing, and went head over heels into the water; and at once the man poling the boat caught him up in one hand and stood him on the deck. The Master was still shaking out his clothes and stamping his feet in his shoes, and grumbling at Monkey, when Monkey brought Sha Monk and Pigsy on, leading the horse and shouldering the loads, and they got aboard too, all of them standing up on the gunwales.
The Buddha leaned lightly on his pole and pushed off — and there, drifting down from upstream, came a dead body. The Elder saw it and was greatly startled.
Monkey said with a laugh, “Master, don't be afraid. That one was you all along.”
Pigsy said so too. “It's you! It's you!” Sha Monk clapped his hands and said so as well. “It's you! It's you!” The man poling the boat struck up his working chant and joined in: “That is you! Congratulations, congratulations!” And the three of them came in with him, all in one voice.
He poled on, and in no long time they were over the Cloud-Touching Immortal Crossing, steady as anything. Only then did Tripitaka turn about and spring lightly up onto the far shore. There is a poem to prove it. The poem says:
Cast off the womb-born body of bone and flesh;
what holds close and holds dear is the primal spirit.
This morning the practice is full and only now is a Buddha made;
washed clean of the six times six dusts of all those years.
This is truly what is meant by the vast and great wisdom, the boundless law of reaching the far shore.
The four of them came ashore and looked back — and the bottomless boat was not to be seen at all. Only then did Monkey say that it had been the Buddha Who Receives and Leads; and only then did Tripitaka understand, and turn about in haste and thank his three disciples instead.
“Neither of us thanks the other,” said Monkey. “We have held each other up, and that is all. It is thanks to our master that we were released; we borrowed his road to work our merit, and by good fortune we have won the true fruit. And our master depended on our protection, and on holding to the teaching and its sustaining power, and so has gladly shed his mortal frame. Master — look at this fine country in front of you, the flowers and grass and pine and bamboo, the phoenixes and cranes and deer. Set it beside the places where fiends showed themselves. Which is the fair one and which the foul? Which the good and which the fearful?”
Tripitaka thanked them again and again.
Every one of them light in body and quick on his feet, they walked up the Spirit Mountain. And soon they saw the ancient temple of Thunderclap:
Its summit rubs the middle of the high sky;
its roots join the veins of Sumeru.
Cunning peaks drawn up in ranks,
strange rocks at uneven heights.
Below the sheer cliffs, jasper grasses and flowers of fine jade;
alongside the winding paths, purple fungus and fragrant orchid.
An immortal ape picking fruit goes into the peach grove —
and it is as though fire were burning gold;
A white crane settling on a pine and standing on the branch-end
is for all the world like smoke cupping jade.
Painted phoenixes two by two,
blue luan birds pair by pair.
Painted phoenixes two by two:
turned to the sun, one cry of theirs is an omen for the world;
blue luan birds pair by pair:
facing into the wind, their glittering dance is a rare thing in this world.
And then they saw the deep dense yellow of golden tiles laid in overlapping pairs, and the bright dazzle of flowered bricks set with agate.
A row to the east, a row to the west, and all of it palaces of flower-hearts and gate-towers of pearl;
A stretch to the south, a stretch to the north, and more treasure-pavilions and precious towers than the eye can finish.
Above the Hall of the Heavenly Kings a rosy light streams out;
before the Hall of the Dharma-Protectors purple flames go up.
The stupa-tower stands plain to see,
the utpala flowers are fragrant.
Truly the ground is so fine you doubt this is the same heaven;
the clouds are so idle you feel the day grow long.
The red dust does not reach here, and all conditions are at an end;
through ten thousand ages the great Dharma Hall stands undiminished.
Master and disciples went strolling at their ease, and walked up to the summit. They saw lay devotees drawn up under the green pines, and holy men ranged among the kingfisher-blue cypress. The Elder made his bow to them at once — which threw the laymen and laywomen, the monks and the nuns, into such a fluster that they pressed their palms together and said, “Holy monk, do not bow to us yet. Wait until you have seen Śākyamuni, and then come and talk with us.”
Monkey said with a laugh, “Too early, too early. Go and bow to the one in the high seat first.”
The Elder, hands waving and feet dancing, followed Monkey right up to the outside of the mountain gate of the Thunderclap Monastery. Over there four great vajra-guardians met them and stopped them. “Is that the holy monk come?”
Tripitaka bowed. “It is. Your disciple Xuanzang has arrived.” Having answered, he would have gone straight in.
“Holy monk, wait a moment,” said the vajra-guardian. “Allow us to report it up, and then you may go in.” And he set one of their number to go round to the mountain gate and report to the four great vajra-guardians at the second gate that the Tang monk had come; and from the second gate it was passed in to the third gate, that the Tang monk had come.
Inside the third gate were the divine monks whose office is the laying-on of offerings; and when they heard, they hurried down to the Great Hero Hall and reported to the Tathāgata, the Most Honoured Śākyamuni Buddha of Letters: “The holy monk of the Tang court has come to the Treasure Mountain to fetch the scriptures.”
The Buddha was greatly pleased. At once he summoned the eight Bodhisattvas, the four vajra-guardians, the five hundred arhats, the three thousand Guardians of the Revelation, the eleven Great Luminaries and the eighteen monastery-protectors, and had them drawn up in two rows. Then he sent down a golden decree, summoning the Tang monk to enter; and inside, tier by tier and rank by rank, they attended reverently to the command and called, “Holy monk, come in.”
So the Tang monk, keeping strictly to rule and measure, went in through the mountain gate with Wukong, Wuneng and Wujing, leading the horse and shouldering the loads. And this is how it was:
In that year he braced his will and took up the imperial commission;
received the warrant, took leave of his king, and went out from the jade stairs.
At clear dawn he climbed the hills to meet the mist and dew;
at yellow dusk he pillowed on stone and lay down in the cloudy murk.
Shouldering his meditation he stepped far, three thousand waters;
his staff in flight, he journeyed long, ten thousand lǐ of cliff.
Thought upon thought held in the heart, he sought the true fruit;
and this morning at last he comes to see the Tathāgata.
The four of them came before the Great Hero Treasure Hall and threw themselves down before the Tathāgata in obeisance. The bowing done, they bowed again to left and to right; and each of them having circled three times over, they knelt bolt upright once more before the Buddha and presented the travel warrant with both hands. The Tathāgata looked them over one by one and handed them back.
Tripitaka bowed his head and made his obeisance. “Your disciple Xuanzang, by command of the Emperor of the Great Tang in the Land of the East, has come far to your Treasure Mountain to beg for the true scriptures, that all living beings may be saved. I beg my Buddha to bend down his grace and grant me an early return to my country.”
The Tathāgata then opened his mouth of pity and put forth his heart of great mercy, and said to Tripitaka: “That Land of the East of yours is the Southern Continent of Jambudvīpa. Because heaven is high there and the earth thick, its goods many and its people crowded, there is much greed and much killing, much lust and much lying, much cheating and much fraud. They do not follow the teaching of the Buddha, nor turn towards good conditions; they do not reverence the three lights, nor value the five grains. Disloyal and unfilial, without duty and without kindness; they deceive their own hearts and darken their own selves; big measures and small scales; they take life and slaughter beasts. So they pile up boundless sin, and their guilt brims and their evil fills, and the calamity of hell comes upon them. And so they fall for ever into the dark, and suffer all those torments of the pestle and the mortar and the grinding mill, and are changed into animals. They take all those shapes that wear fur and carry horns, and they repay their debts with their bodies and feed men with their flesh. And those who fall for ever into Avīci and may not rise again — it is all for this reason.
“Master Kong did indeed set up among them a teaching of kindness and duty, propriety and wisdom; and their emperors have followed one another, and their governance has its penalties of servitude, banishment, strangling and beheading. But what is to be done with the ignorant and unenlightened, with that sort who run loose and fear nothing?
“Now I have scriptures in three baskets, which can lift a man clear of suffering and distress, and untie the knot of calamity and fault. Three baskets: there is one basket of Dharma, which discourses on heaven; there is one basket of Treatises, which speaks of earth; and there is one basket of Sutras, which ferries the dead across. In all thirty-five works, amounting to fifteen thousand one hundred and forty-four scrolls. Truly they are the path of cultivating the real, and the gate of upright goodness. Of all the four great continents under heaven — their astronomy and geography, their peoples, their birds and beasts, their flowers and trees, their implements and their human affairs — there is not one sort of thing they do not record.
“You have come far, and I would give you the whole of it to take away; but the people of that quarter are stupid and coarse and headstrong, and they slander the true word, and do not understand the deep purport of my religion.”
He called: “Ānanda, Kāśyapa — you two take these four down to the treasure-loft and give them a meal first. When they have eaten, open the treasure-pavilion, and out of my scriptures of the three baskets, from within the thirty-five works, check out a few scrolls of each for them, and let them pass it on in the Land of the East and pour down that great grace for ever.”
The two venerables at once received the command and led the four of them down to the foot of the loft. There was no end to the looking: rare treasures and strange gems, ranged out without limit. And they saw the gods whose office is the setting-out of offerings laying on a meatless banquet — and it was all immortal fare: immortal dishes, immortal tea, immortal fruit, a hundred flavours of delicacy, and nothing like the mortal world. Master and disciples bowed their heads to the ground in thanks for the Buddha's grace, and ate as much as they liked. And in truth it was:
Treasure-flames and golden light dazzle the eye;
strange fragrances and rare dishes, finer still and more subtle.
A thousand tiers of golden pavilion, lovely past all end;
one strain of immortal music, clear as it enters the ear.
Plain flavours and immortal flowers that men have seldom seen;
fragrant tea and strange food that win one long life.
All this while they have borne a thousand kinds of hardship;
today comes glory, and the joy of the Way accomplished.
This time it was Pigsy's good fortune, and Sha Monk got the bargain of it. In the Buddha's own place there was food that sets the span right and gives long life, that changes the womb and exchanges the bone; and they were left to have their fill of it.
The two venerables kept the four company until the meal was done, and then went into the treasure-pavilion, opened the door and went up to look. Over that way were rosy light and lucky vapours, wrapping it round in a thousand layers; coloured mist and auspicious cloud, spreading over and hiding it in ten thousand streams. On the scripture cabinets and outside the treasure-cases, red labels were pasted, with the names of the scrolls written out in the formal hand. And they were:
The Nirvana Sutra — one work in 748 scrolls.
The Bodhisattva Sutra — one work in 1,021 scrolls.
The Space-Treasury Sutra — one work in 400 scrolls.
The Śūraṅgama Sutra — one work in 110 scrolls.
The Great Collection of the Sutra of Kindly Intent — one work in 50 scrolls.
The Sutra of Determination — one work in 140 scrolls.
The Treasury Sutra — one work in 45 scrolls.
The Flower-Garland Sutra — one work in 500 scrolls.
The Sutra of Homage to Suchness — one work in 90 scrolls.
The Great Perfection-of-Wisdom Sutra — one work in 916 scrolls.
The Sutra of Radiance — one work in 300 scrolls.
The Sutra of Things Never Known Before — one work in 1,110 scrolls.
The Vimalakīrti Sutra — one work in 170 scrolls.
The Separate Sutra of the Three Treatises — one work in 270 scrolls.
The Diamond Sutra — one work in 100 scrolls.
The Treatise-Sutra of the True Dharma — one work in 120 scrolls.
The Sutra of the Buddha's Deeds — one work in 800 scrolls.
The Five Dragons Sutra — one work in 32 scrolls.
The Bodhisattva Precepts Sutra — one work in 116 scrolls.
The Great Collection Sutra — one work in 130 scrolls.
The Magadha Sutra — one work in 350 scrolls.
The Lotus Sutra — one work in 100 scrolls.
The Yoga Sutra — one work in 100 scrolls.
The Sutra of the Constant Treasure — one work in 220 scrolls.
The Treatise-Sutra of the Western Heaven — one work in 130 scrolls.
The Saṃgha Sutra — one work in 157 scrolls.
Miscellaneous Sutras of the Buddha-Land — one work in 1,950 scrolls.
The Treatise-Sutra of the Awakening of Faith — one work in 1,000 scrolls.
The Great Wisdom-Perfection Sutra — one work in 1,080 scrolls.
The Sutra of Precious Majesty — one work in 1,280 scrolls.
The Sutra of the Original Pavilion — one work in 850 scrolls.
The Sutra of the True Vinaya Text — one work in 200 scrolls.
The Great Peacock Sutra — one work in 220 scrolls.
The Treatise-Sutra of Consciousness-Only — one work in 100 scrolls.
The Abhidharmakośa Treatise-Sutra — one work in 200 scrolls.
Ānanda and Kāśyapa took the Tang monk over the whole list of titles, and then said to him, “Holy monk, you have come all this way from the Land of the East — what have you brought us by way of a present? Bring it out quickly, and we shall hand over the scriptures for you to take away.”
Tripitaka heard this and said, “Your disciple Xuanzang has come a long road, and has not made anything ready.”
The two venerables laughed. “Fine, fine, fine. Hand the scriptures on bare-handed to keep the line going, and those who come after us will starve to death.”
Monkey saw them haggling and hanging back and refusing to hand anything over, and could not hold it in. “Master — let us go and lay a complaint before the Tathāgata, and make him come and give the scriptures to old Monkey himself.”
“Stop bawling,” said Ānanda. “What sort of place do you think this is, that you should still be running wild and playing the rogue? Come over here and take the scriptures.”
Pigsy and Sha Monk held their tempers and talked Monkey down, then turned and took delivery, packing the scrolls away one by one into the bundles, loading them on the horse, and tying up two more shoulder-loads besides, which they carried between them. Then they came before the jewelled seat, knocked their heads on the floor, thanked the Tathāgata, and went straight out. Meeting a buddha, they bowed twice; seeing a bodhisattva, they bowed twice; and coming to the great gate, they bowed to the monks and nuns and the laymen and laywomen, took their leave of each of them in turn, and went down the mountain and away along the road. Of that, no more.
Now up in the treasure-pavilion there was an Ancient Buddha, the Lamp-Lighter, who had been quietly listening from above to the whole business of handing over the scriptures; and he understood it perfectly well — that what Ānanda and Kāśyapa had handed over was a wordless canon.
He said to himself with a laugh, “The monks of the East are ignorant and deluded, and will not recognise a wordless scripture. Would that not make a waste of the holy monk's whole long journey?” Then he asked, “Who is here beside my seat?” And out stepped the Venerable White Hero.
“Rouse up your divine power,” said the Ancient Buddha, “overtake the Tang monk swift as a shooting star, take the wordless scriptures away from him, and make him come back and ask again for true scriptures with words in them.”
The Venerable White Hero at once rode out on a wild wind, rolled away beyond the mountain gate of the Thunderclap Monastery, and put out his divine power in full. And that was a fine wind indeed:
A warrior from before the Buddha, not to be matched with the Wind-God of Xun;
an immortal's vent howling in anger, far outdoing the puffing of a young girl.
At this blast the fish and the dragons all lost their holes, and the rivers and seas ran their waves backwards.
The dark ape with fruit in his hands could hardly come forward to offer it; the yellow crane turned back from the clouds to look for its old nest.
The cinnabar phoenix could not make its clear note come out well; the brocade pheasant's crowing came out a harsh noise.
Green pine boughs snapped; the utpala flowers blew loose.
Kingfisher bamboo went over pole after pole; the golden lotuses shook bloom by bloom.
The bell's voice was carried three thousand lǐ away; the cadence of the chanting flew light over ten thousand ravines.
Below the cliffs the rare flowers had their beauty spoiled; beside the road the jasper grasses were laid flat, bright shoots and all.
The painted luan could hardly work its wings; the white deer took cover under the cliff.
Vast and sweeping, a strange fragrance flooded all space and time; clear and clean, the breath of the wind went right through to the clouds.
The Tang Elder was going along when all at once he smelled the fragrant wind rolling up, and took it for a good omen from the Buddha, and was not on his guard. Then he heard a sound, and out of the middle air a hand reached down and lightly snatched away the scriptures the horse was carrying.
Tripitaka was so terrified that he beat his breast and cried out; Pigsy rolled along the ground in pursuit; Sha Monk stood guard over the scripture-loads; and Pilgrim Sun went after it fast as flying. The Venerable White Hero, seeing Pilgrim getting close behind him, and fearing that the end of that staff had no eyes in it and might in one careless moment do him an injury, dashed the scripture-bundle to pieces there and then and let it fall into the dust. Pilgrim saw the bundle burst and fall, and the fragrant wind blowing the contents about, so he came down from his cloud to see to the scriptures instead of going on with the chase; and the Venerable White Hero gathered up his wind and furled his mist, and went back to report. Of that, no more.
Pigsy, who had gone after it, saw the volumes come down, and helped Pilgrim gather them up and carry them on his back to the Tang monk, whose eyes filled with tears. “Disciples — even in this Land of Ultimate Bliss there are fierce fiends to cheat and injure us.”
Sha Monk took the loose scrolls he had been holding and opened one to look — and it was snow-white, without half a stroke of writing on it. In alarm he passed it over. “Master — this scroll has no words on it.” Pilgrim opened another and looked, and it had no words either. Pigsy opened one, and it had no words either.
“Open the whole lot and look!” cried Tripitaka. Scroll after scroll, all of it white paper.
The Elder sighed short and sighed long. “We people of the East truly have no luck. What use is it to carry off empty books like these with no words in them? How shall I dare to face the Tang king? The crime of deceiving one's sovereign — truly, execution would not be enough for it.”
Pilgrim had known it all along. “Master, say no more. This is those fellows Ānanda and Kāśyapa asking us for a present, and getting none, and so palming these white-paper books off on us. Let us go straight back and lay a complaint before the Tathāgata, and charge them with extortion and collusion.”
“Just so, just so,” bawled Pigsy. “Let us go and report them!” And the four of them hurried back up the mountain with no good footing under them, and in all haste turned up towards Thunderclap again.
Before long they were outside the mountain gate, and everyone there put their hands together and greeted them, laughing. “Has the holy monk come to change the scriptures?” Tripitaka nodded and thanked them. The vajra-guardians did not block the way either, but let them through, straight to the front of the Great Hero Hall.
Pilgrim bawled out, “Tathāgata! Master and disciples have taken ten thousand stings and a thousand fiends, a thousand bitternesses and ten thousand hardships, and have bowed our way here from the Land of the East. You gave orders that the scriptures were to be handed over, and Ānanda and Kāśyapa, failing to squeeze money out of us, colluded together and deliberately gave us wordless white-paper books to carry away. What use is it for us to carry them off? I beg the Tathāgata to issue a ruling.”
The Buddha said with a laugh, “Stop your bawling a moment. As for those two asking you for a present — I know about it already. But scripture may not be handed on lightly, nor may it be taken for nothing. In former times a company of holy monks went down the mountain with these scriptures and recited them once through at the house of Squire Zhao in the kingdom of Śrāvastī, keeping the living of that house safe and setting its dead free; and all they asked back for it was three dǒu and three shēng of gold in grains. And I told them at the time they had sold it far too cheap, and that their descendants would be left with no money to spend.
“You came now to take them empty-handed, and that is why they handed you blank copies. And the blank copies are the true scriptures without words — which are, as it happens, good ones. But because the living beings of that Land of the East of yours are ignorant and unawakened, there is nothing for it but to pass on these instead.”
Then he called out, “Ānanda, Kāśyapa — be quick and check out a few scrolls of each work from the true scriptures with words in them, and come back here and report the count.”
The two venerables led the four of them back down to the treasure-pavilion, and asked the Tang monk for a present again. Tripitaka had nothing to offer, so he told Sha Monk to bring out the purple-gold alms bowl, and presented it with both hands. “Your disciple is truly poor and has come a long road, and did not get any present ready. This bowl was given me by the Tang king with his own hand, that your disciple might carry it and beg his food along the road. I offer it up now, as some slight token of my heart. I earnestly beg the venerables to accept it, and when I return to court and report to the Tang king there will certainly be a handsome thanks. Only let the true scriptures with words in them be bestowed, so that the purpose of an imperial commission and the labour of so long a journey may not be wasted.”
Ānanda took it, and only smiled a little. And the strong-arms who keep the treasure-pavilion, and the cooks who keep the kitchen, and the venerables who mind the loft, all set on him — one wiping his face, another slapping his back, flicking their fingers at him and curling their lips, and every one of them laughing: “Shame on you, shame on you — dunning the scripture-seekers for a present!” In a moment his face was wrinkled up with shame — but he kept hold of the bowl and would not let go.
Only then did Kāśyapa go into the loft to check out the scriptures, and went over them with Tripitaka one by one. And Tripitaka called out, “Disciples — every one of you look carefully, and let it not be like last time.” The three of them took a scroll and looked at a scroll, and every one of them had words in it.
Five thousand and forty-eight scrolls were handed over, which is the count of one full basket. It was all packed up neat and loaded on the horse; and what was left over made up another shoulder-load besides, which Pigsy carried. Their own baggage Sha Monk carried. Pilgrim led the horse; the Tang monk took up his ringed staff, settled his Vairocana cap with a pat and shook out his brocade cassock, and only then, in high good spirits, came before the Tathāgata. And this is how it was:
The true scriptures of the great canon have a sweet savour;
the Tathāgata wrought them very fine and strict.
You should know how bitter Xuanzang's climb was;
and how laughable that Ānanda was fond of money.
The first time it was not looked into — thanks to the Ancient Buddha;
afterwards, with the genuine article, they were easy at last.
To this day it has passed happily to the Land of the East,
and all beings alike are wetted by that rain and dew.
Ānanda and Kāśyapa brought the Tang monk to see the Tathāgata. The Tathāgata mounted high on his lotus throne and directed the two great arhats, the Dragon-Subduer and the Tiger-Tamer, to strike the cloud-chime; and he summoned in one call three thousand buddhas, three thousand Guardians of the Revelation, the eight vajra-guardians, the four bodhisattvas, five hundred venerable arhats, eight hundred monks, the whole company of laymen, nuns and laywomen, from every heaven and every grotto, from the blessed grounds and the spirit mountains — venerables and holy monks great and small: those who should sit, to take their places on the treasure-seats, and those who should stand, to stand in attendance on both sides.
In a moment heavenly music was heard far off and the immortal strains rang clear; the whole sky was layer upon layer of lucky light and fold upon fold of auspicious vapour; and the buddhas all assembled and paid their respects.
The Tathāgata asked, “Ānanda, Kāśyapa — how many scrolls of scripture have you handed over to him? Report the figures one by one.”
The two venerables at once opened their report: “Now handed over to the Tang court:”
The Nirvana Sutra — 400 scrolls.
The Bodhisattva Sutra — 360 scrolls.
The Space-Treasury Sutra — 20 scrolls.
The Śūraṅgama Sutra — 30 scrolls.
The Great Collection of the Sutra of Kindly Intent — 40 scrolls.
The Sutra of Determination — 40 scrolls.
The Treasury Sutra — 20 scrolls.
The Flower-Garland Sutra — 81 scrolls.
The Sutra of Homage to Suchness — 30 scrolls.
The Great Perfection-of-Wisdom Sutra — 600 scrolls.
The Sutra of Great Radiance — 50 scrolls.
The Sutra of Things Never Known Before — 550 scrolls.
The Vimalakīrti Sutra — 30 scrolls.
The Separate Sutra of the Three Treatises — 42 scrolls.
The Diamond Sutra — 1 scroll.
The Treatise-Sutra of the True Dharma — 20 scrolls.
The Sutra of the Buddha's Deeds — 116 scrolls.
The Five Dragons Sutra — 20 scrolls.
The Bodhisattva Precepts Sutra — 60 scrolls.
The Great Collection Sutra — 30 scrolls.
The Magadha Sutra — 140 scrolls.
The Lotus Sutra — 10 scrolls.
The Yoga Sutra — 30 scrolls.
The Sutra of the Constant Treasure — 170 scrolls.
The Treatise-Sutra of the Western Heaven — 30 scrolls.
The Saṃgha Sutra — 110 scrolls.
Miscellaneous Sutras of the Buddha-Land — 1,638 scrolls.
The Treatise-Sutra of the Awakening of Faith — 50 scrolls.
The Great Wisdom-Perfection Sutra — 90 scrolls.
The Sutra of Precious Majesty — 140 scrolls.
The Sutra of the Original Pavilion — 56 scrolls.
The Sutra of the True Vinaya Text — 10 scrolls.
The Great Peacock Sutra — 14 scrolls.
The Treatise-Sutra of Consciousness-Only — 10 scrolls.
The Abhidharmakośa Treatise-Sutra — 10 scrolls.
“Of the whole canon in the basket there are thirty-five works, and out of each of them we have checked five thousand and forty-eight scrolls in all, to be handed to the holy monk of the East and left in the Tang. All of it is now packed and set in order on the horse's back and the carrying-poles, and they wait only to give thanks for the favour.”
Tripitaka and the four of them tethered the horse, set down the loads, and one by one pressed their palms together, bowed from the waist, and made their obeisance towards the seat above.
The Tathāgata said to the Tang monk, “The merit of these scriptures cannot be weighed or measured. Though they are the tortoise and the mirror of my own house, they are in truth the wellspring of the three teachings. When you reach that Southern Continent of yours, show them to all living beings, and let none treat them lightly. Without bathing and keeping the fast, they are not to be opened. Treasure them. Weigh them heavy. For within them lies the deep secret of becoming an immortal and completing the Way, and the rare prescription that brings to light the ten thousand transformations.”
Tripitaka knocked his head on the floor and gave thanks for the favour, received it in faith and undertook to carry it out, went round the Buddha three times over in reverence as before, took it up carefully and with a whole heart, and departed with the scriptures. Going out to the third gate, he thanked all the holy ones again one by one. Of that, no more.
Only after the Tathāgata had seen the Tang monk off did he break up the assembly for the handing over of the scriptures. Then from the side Guanyin stepped forward, pressed her palms together and addressed the Buddha: “Your disciple took the golden decree in that year and went east to seek out a man to fetch the scriptures; and it has now succeeded, coming to fourteen years in all, which is five thousand and forty days — still eight days short, and not matching the count of the canon. I beg my World-Honoured One to grant the holy monk an early return east and back west again, so that within eight days the count of the canon may be made complete. And grant that your disciple may hand the golden decree back.”
The Tathāgata was greatly pleased. “What you say is most fitting. The golden decree may be handed back.”
At once he called the eight great vajra-guardians and gave his orders: “Rouse your divine power quickly, carry the holy monk back east, see the true scriptures handed down and left there, and bring him west again straight away. It must be within eight days, to complete the count of one full basket. Let there be no delay or disobedience.”
The vajra-guardians caught up with the Tang monk at once and called, “You there, fetching the scriptures — come along with us.” The Tang monk and the rest were all light in body and sound in limb, and drifting and floating they followed the vajra-guardians and rose on the clouds. And this is how it was:
Seeing one's nature and clearing the mind, one attends upon the Buddha;
the merit finished and the practice full, at once one rises in flight.
In the end there is no knowing how the handing down went once they were back in the Land of the East; listen, and the next chapter will explain.