Monkey now came down to earth and stood beside Sanzang, Pig and Friar Sand in front of the throne hall watching the Taoist struggling without success to climb out of the boiling oil. Then the Taoist slipped back into the cauldron, and in an instant his bones came apart as his skin was fried crisp and his flesh cooked tender.
The official supervising the executions came in again to report, “Your Majesty, the Third Teacher of the Nation has been deep-fried to death.” The tears gushed from the king's eyes as he struck the table by the throne and cried aloud,
“Hard is the gaining of life and hard is its end;
Elixir never refine without true instruction.
Vainly the spirits are raced and water-spells made;
Pills that can make you immortal are only a fiction.
Nirvana can never be won by a mind in disorder;
Cunning is useless when all it can cause is destruction.
Had I been warned that all could so easily fail,
I'd have kept to the diet and chosen a life of inaction.”
Indeed:
There was no use in the golden touch and in making elixir;
Calling up wind and summoning rain all ended in failure.
If you do not know how the master and his disciples continued, listen to the explanation in the next installment.
Chapter 47
The Holy Monk Is Stopped by the River of Heaven at Night
Metal and Wood in Their Mercy Rescue a Child
The king collapsed on his throne in tears and cried till nightfall. Then Monkey stepped forward and called out, “Don't be so silly. Look at those Taoists' bodies. One was a tiger and the other was a deer. Antelope Power was an antelope. If you don't believe me, have his bones fished out and take a look at them. Is that a human skeleton? They were all mountain beasts who became spirits and came here to destroy you. The only reason they had not struck yet was because your life force is still strong; but in another couple of years when your life force was weaker they would have murdered you and your whole kingdom would have been theirs. You are very lucky that we came here in time to destroy their evil and save your life. What are you crying for? Give us our passport at once and let us go.”
This finally brought the king to his senses, and then the civil and military officials reported together, “The first two who died were indeed a white deer and a yellow tiger; and the cauldron contains the bones of an antelope. The holy monk must be believed.”
“If that is the case I must thank the holy monk,” said the king, who then said to his tutor, “it is late now, so please take the holy monks to the Deep Wisdom Monastery. Tomorrow morning the Eastern hall of the palace shall be opened up and the royal kitchens shall lay on a vegetarian banquet as a mark of our thanks.” They were then taken to the monastery, where they slept that night.
Shortly before dawn the next morning the king held an audience at which he ordered the officials to issue a notice to be posted at the four gates of the city and on every road recalling Buddhist monks. While the banquet was being set out the king went in his carriage to the gates of the Deep Wisdom Monastery to invite the Tang Priest and his disciples to the banquet in the Eastern hall of the palace.
When the Buddhist monks who had escaped learned of the notice they all returned in delight to the city to find the Great Sage Monkey, return his hairs, and thank him. When the banquet was over the king returned Sanzang the passport and escorted him out through the gates of the palace with his queen, consorts and concubines and the civil and military officials, The Buddhist monks could be seen kneeling beside the road and calling out, “Great Sage Equaling Heaven, we are the monks your lordship saved on the sandbank. Now that we have heard that you lordship has destroyed those evil beings and saved us, and His Majesty has issued a notice recalling us monks, we have come to return your hairs and kowtow in gratitude.”
“How many of you are there here?” Monkey asked.
“All five hundred: we are not one short.”
Monkey then shook himself and took the hairs back before saying to king, subjects, monks and lay people alike, “It was I who released these monks, it was I who took the cart through the two gates and along the ridge before smashing it, and it was I who killed those evil Taoists. Now that the evil has been destroyed you will realize that there is a Way in the Buddha's faith. From now on you must have no more foolish beliefs. I hope that you will combine the three teachings by honoring both the Buddhist clergy and the Way of Taoism, and by also educating men of talent in the Confucian tradition. I can guarantee that this will make you kingdom secure for ever.” The king accepted this advice and expressed his gratitude at great length as he accompanied the Tang Priest out of the city.
Because they were seriously seeking the scriptures,
They strove to maintain their brightness of spirit.
Setting out at dawn and not stopping till nightfall, they drank when thirsty and ate when hungry. Before they realized it spring and summer were over and it was autumn again. Late one day the Tang Priest reined in his horse and asked, “Where shall we spend the night, disciples?”
“Master,” said Monkey, “a man of religion shouldn't talk like a layman.”
“What is the difference in the way they talk?” Sanzang asked.
“At a time like this,” said Monkey, “a layman would be fast asleep in a warm bed wrapped up in a quilt with his child in his arms and a wife to keep his feet warm. We monks can't expect anything like that. We have only the moon and the stars to cover us with. We dine on the wind and sleep in the dew. We travel when we can find a way and only stop when there's no way forward.”
“Brother,” said Pig, “you only know half of the story. The trail is very steep now and I can barely manage my heavy load. We've got to find somewhere where I can get a good night's sleep and build myself up to carry my load tomorrow. Otherwise I'm going to collapse from exhaustion.”
“Let's go a little further in the moonlight,” said Monkey. “When we reach a house we can stay there.” Master and disciples had no choice but to carry on with Monkey.
They had not been going for long when they heard the sound of waves. “That's done it,” said Pig. “We've come to the end of the road.”
“There's a river in our way,” said Friar Sand.
“How are we going to get across?” asked the Tang Priest.
“Let me test it for depth,” said Pig.
“Don't talk nonsense, Wuneng,” said Sanzang. “How could you test the water for depth?”
“Find a pebble the size of a goose egg and throw it in,” Pig replied. “If it makes a big splash the water's shallow; and if it goes down with bubbles the water's deep.”
“Test it then,” said Monkey. The idiot then picked up a stone and threw it into the water; they heard the bubbles rising as the stone sunk.
“It's deep, too deep,” he said, “we'll never get across.”
“You have tested for depth,” said the Tang Priest, “but we don't know how wide it is.”
“I can't tell that,” said Pig.
“Let me have a look,” said Monkey. The splendid Great Sage sprang up into mid-air on his cloud and took a good look. What he saw was:
The light of the moon immersed in the vastness,
The floating reflection of the limitless sky.
The magical stream has swallowed Mount Hua;
Hundreds of rivers flow into its waters.
Waves in their thousands rise and then fall,
Towering breakers crash without number.
No fisherman burns his fire by the shore;
The herons are all now asleep on the sand.
It is as turbid and huge as the ocean,
And there is no end to its water in sight.