Authors: Yueh Tung
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At the opening of
Journey to the West
Monkey ruled as the king of the monkey inhabitants of Water-curtain Cave in the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit.
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In chapter 7 of
Journey to the West
Monkey goes on a rampage in the Heavenly Palace of the Jade Emperor until he is finally subdued by Buddha.
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Prior to his rebellion in Heaven, Monkey held the position of Stable Master of the Heavenly Palace.
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The Chinese original is obscure here. The author probably compares the New T'ang Emperor to King Hsüan of Chou (r. 827-780 B.C.), who brought about a restoration of the Chou dynasty.
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Lady Ch'ing-kuo (Ch'ing-kuo fu-jen) literally means “lady whose beauty can topple a state.”
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Kao-t'ang is the name of a terrace in the Yün-meng Marshes in the ancient state of Ch'u. According to legend, King Hsiang of Ch'u once visited the terrace and dreamed that he slept with the Goddess of Wu Mountain. In Chinese literature, therefore, allusions to Kao-t'ang always have erotic connotations.
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Ch'ang O is a mythical lady supposed to live in the moon. She was originally the wife of the archer Hou I during the reign of the sage-emperor Yao. Ch'ang O stole some elixir from her husband and, after having taken it, flew to the moon, where she still lives in eternal loneliness.
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Spinning Lady and the Cowherd are a pair of lovers associated in folklore with the stars Vega and Altair. Separated by the Milky Way, they are fated to meet only once each year, on the seventh of the seventh moon.
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Shu is the classical name for the area of present-day Szechwan province, and Wu is the classical name for the area of present-day Kiangsu and Chekiang Provinces.
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The First Emperor of Ch'in was the ruler who effected the unification of China in 221 B.C. and was the first to assume the imperial title.
Hsüan-tsang Is To Be Commissioned and Given a Peach Flower Battle-Axe; The Mind-Monkey Is Startled by the Axes of Sky Gougers.
When Monkey heard the music he flew right out through Tiger Gate. After passing many towers and courtyards, he finally came to a carved green portico where the emperor sat surrounded by numerous officials. As he drew near, he saw the emperor blanch and say to his officials: “Yesterday I was reading the
Precious Instructions of the August Tang
. One section related, ‘The T'ang priest Ch'en Hsüan-tsang impersonated a monk and deluded our royal ancestor. His disciples were all Water-curtain Cave and Stony Brook
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types. Abbot's staff and begging bowl became weapons like the wooden rake
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and metal cudgel. Forty years later, Hsüan-tsang led his disciples on an invasion of our territory. He was indeed a great enemy.’
“Another section related that ‘five hundred years ago Sun Wu-k'ung rebelled against Heaven. He wanted to drag the Jade Emperor down from his throne and deposit him at the bottom of the stairs. However, the Mandate of Heaven had not expired, and Buddha put down the rebellion. If Sun Wu-K'ung could rebel against Heaven, how much more could he rebel against mortals? And yet the T'ang Priest accepted him as his number-one disciple. Why? He wanted to use his journey to the West to establish hegemony over the Southeast. He relied on the awesomeness of the ape and his dragon-horse
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to secure his position as a shark among fish.’
“When I read those words, I became frightened. But if I order Regional Commander Chao Ch'eng to go west to decapitate this priest
and bring back his head, then spare his disciples and cause them to disperse, that should put an end to the matter.”
The Vice Director of State Affairs Li K'uang stepped forward and said, “This bald-headed Ch'en Hsüan-tsang shouldn't be killed—he should be used. You should simply use him to kill himself; you shouldn't have someone else kill him.”
As soon as Li K'uang finished speaking the emperor ordered his generals to go to the arsenal. There they selected a flying dragon sword, a King Wu blade, a stone sickle, a thunder-flower lance, an ornately carved five-cloud spear, a black-horse breastplate, silver-fish armor, a flying-tiger jade tent-standard, a great Yao and Shun banner, a peach blossom battle-axe, a ninth-month axe, a glass moon-mirror helmet, a red and gold flying-fish cape, a pair of demon-killing crystal-threaded boots, and a Big Dipper fan. All these things were sealed along with an imperial edict on yellow silk and sent by express messenger to the West. The proclamation, addressed to “Ch'en Hsüan-tsang, Brother of the Emperor, Supreme Commander for Wiping out Desire,” read:
O great and trustworthy General, honorable as the tallies of jadeite, straight as the red strings of a lute: Yesterday all the lords from every direction spurred their horses to the Fatherland and competed with each other to report your martial valor, which has left the mermaids of the western region speechless and the mirages at sea without form. It is difficult to find a man such as you in time of crisis or prosperity. We have often admired you and have heard only good about you. We turn our eyes to the western mountains and sigh with grief. Now bandits run amok in the West. Reports come daily from the passes. This is because Heaven resents separations, and it is time that you, Our mendicant monk, return. General, why don't you leap up from your white pool and beat your sword of intelligence, take off your dark robe and pour out your bag of wisdom? After you've cleared the green wood of bandits and the beacon fires no longer burn, We will personally bind the head of your horse with one foot of white silk. This day you will carry a carved spear and wear silver armor. Soon you will sleep in tents painted with beasts. It would be difficult to inscribe Our expressions of tearful thanks for your deeds, even on all the pillars of the K'un-lun Mountains that support Heaven. Who under the sun that hangs on Heaven's Wall could compose fitting words upon your return? We hope you, General, will mull this over once and then again. We have long wearied of resorting to coral bow and green-jade arrows.
The emperor ordered a jade tally brought from the palace and gave it to a messenger. Having received the imperial order, the messenger took the tally, the seal, and the edict and galloped out of the city.
Monkey was shocked and afraid something might happen to entangle his Master. Not daring to make a sound, he immediately started in pursuit of the messenger. He fluttered down like a plum blossom, landing outside the city gate. There he resumed his normal appearance and searched for the messenger, but the messenger had already ridden out of sight. Monkey became even more distressed. Not only had he failed to discover the truth or falsehood of the New T'ang, now he had heard that, out of the blue, his Master was to be made a general. Monkey was startled, frightened, and seized with melancholy. As he jumped up to go search for his Master, he heard voices high in the air. He peered up and saw a great crowd of people swinging axes and using chisels to gouge holes in the sky.
Monkey considered, “They don't have the look of celestial workers or ominous or evil stars. They are obviously people from earth, but why are they doing this sort of work there? They aren't monsters disguised as men because I see no evil aura about them. Could it be that Heaven is infected with scabies and needs people to scratch its back? Or maybe Heaven has grown extra bones and has asked a surgeon to remove them? Or maybe Heaven is too old and they are chiseling it away so they can put in a new one. Or maybe Heaven has been covered by a screen, and they are removing the false Heaven for the real one. Or maybe the Milky Way has flooded and they are channeling away the excess. Or maybe they are rebuilding the Palace of Magic Mists and this is an auspicious day to break ground. Or maybe Heaven likes elaboration and has asked these people to carve a myriad lines to make a beautiful scene. Or maybe the Jade Emperor misses this mortal world and they are opening an imperial road so he can visit more often.
“I wonder if Heaven's blood is red or white. Or if Heaven's skin is one or two layers thick. Or if there will be a heart or not when Heaven's chest is opened. Or if Heaven's heart is slanted or straight. Or if Heaven is young or old, if it's male or female. Maybe they want to open Heaven and let its mountains hang down and dwarf the earth's mountains. Or maybe they are opening a mouth for Heaven to swallow the Underworld. But even if any of these things are true, no one on earth could have such power. I'll just go up and ask them; then I'll know for sure.”
Monkey shouted, “You officers digging at Heaven! What king's men are you? Why are you doing this strange thing?”
All of them dropped their axes and chisels and saluted Monkey from the sky. They said, “Your Reverence from the Southeast, we are called Sky-walkers and come from Goldfish Village. Twenty years ago a wandering Taoist taught us the method of sky walking. In our village everyone knows how to write and recite charms and ride the clouds, so we changed the name of the village from Goldfish to Sky-walking Village. All our children are called Sky-walkers. Everyone in our village can move about in the sky.
“Who would have thought that when the king of the Emerald Green World—who is called Little Moon King—recently took in a monk, that the monk would turn out to be the second master of Sun Wu-k'ung, the Eminent Guest of the Underworld, Rebel in Heaven, Great Sage Equal of Heaven, and Master of Water-curtain Cave? He was none other than the great T'ang priest Hsüan-tsang, who received from the legitimate emperor of the Great T'ang a cassock studded with a hundred jewels, a five-colored abbot's staff, and the title ‘Emperor's Younger Brother.’
“This priest, whose secular name is Ch'en, was pure and chaste, never eating meat or drinking wine, nor allowing his eye to roam. He was more than qualified to go to the Western Paradise. But that Monkey Sun was berserk! He cut people down as if they were grass. The road to the West flowed red with the blood of his victims. When people talk about him they grind their teeth in hatred.
“The ruler of the kingdom called Great Compassion has taken pity on the suffering people and completely blocked the road to the West with a bronze wall that reaches to the sky. Knowing that Monkey could transform himself and become tall or short, he spread a closely meshed ‘net of longing’ for sixty thousand miles to go with the bronze wall. Since then, the western and eastern heavens have been divided in two. There is no way to cross over—not by boat or cart, water or land. On learning this, the T'ang Priest was utterly crushed. That Monkey just stamped his feet and ran off. The priest's second disciple, Pigsy, and third disciple, Sandy, could only cry, and the white horse the priest rides wouldn't eat even a mouthful of grass.
“In this moment of crisis, the T'ang Priest came up with a plan. He told his second and third disciples not to worry, whipped his horse and galloped into the Emerald Green World. The moment Little Moon King saw the priest, he was sure they had been lovers in a previous life and treated him like his own flesh and blood. He insisted on giving his Emerald Green World to the priest, but the T'ang Priest firmly refused, being determined only to go to the Western Paradise. Then Little Moon
King tried to press against the priest, and the Tang Priest had to push him off.
The king kept making advances but the monk just kept pushing him away.
“After several days, Little Moon King had thought of nothing that might solve the Priest's problem, so he summoned the worthies of the realm for consultation. One of them devised a plan: ‘If you could find some sky gougers, they could open up Heaven and allow Mr. Ch'en to leap right into the Jade Emperor's palace. There he could ask for a pass and proceed directly to the Western Paradise. That seems like a good idea.’
“Little Moon King was half pleased and half doubtful, but he straightaway called out soldiers and cavalry to search everywhere for sky gougers. When they came across a group of us catching wild geese in the air, they moved in on us. One general in golden armor waved his arms, pointed at us excitedly, and shouted, ‘Here are the sky gougers! Surround them for me, little soldiers. Get them all, every one. Put them in cangues and chains and we'll take them to the king.’
“Little Moon King was delighted. He ordered his men to remove the cangues and take off the chains and immediately had fine red wine brought and given to us. Then he forced us to chip away at the sky. As the saying goes, ‘The skilful don't seem busy, and the busy aren't skilful. We do all sorts of other things, but we aren't used to digging into the sky with axes. Today we were treated so nicely by the king that we had no choice but to sharpen our tools and force ourselves to learn to dig at the firmament. We've been looking up for so long that our necks are stiff, and standing in the air so long that our legs ache. Around noon we pooled our strength and with one thrust cracked into Heaven.
How were we to know we hit right at the foundation of the Palace of Magic Mists and caused it, all shiny and bright, to come tumbling down? There was a great commotion in Heaven and people yelled, ‘Catch the thieves!’ The panic didn't ease up for a long time.
“But the stars must be with us, because someone else will take the blame for what we did. After the commotion died down we were pretty scared. But when we bent our ears to listen, we heard Lao-tzu tell the Jade Emperor, ‘Don't be angry. Don't get upset. This couldn't be the work of anyone but that Little slave-dog of a Stable Groom, Monkey Sun. If you send out Heavenly soldiers now, I'm afraid there'll be trouble. It would be better to ask Buddha to crush him beneath Five Phases Mountain. We must tell Buddha that Monkey is never again to be set free.’
“When we heard this, we knew we were in the clear, or at least we figured someone would take the blame, so we began to dig here again. There won't be another Palace of Magic Mists to tumble down.
But it's too bad about Monkey Sun. In the world below he's hated all along the road to the West, and in the world above they rage at him. They've also sent word to Buddha, and when Kuan-yin sees that Buddha puts the blame on the ape, she won't dare welcome him with her usual graces. Then we'll see where he can go!”
Someone else said, “Bah! Why feel sorry for that ape Sun? If it weren't for that slave-dog ape, we wouldn't be working here.”
All the people wielding axes cried, “You're right! Curse that ape!” A great roar went up, with everyone shouting different things at the same time. “Stable Boy!” “Wine Thief!”
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“Elixir Stealer!” “Ginseng Robber!” “Monkey Monster Tramp!” They cursed Monkey till his golden eyes blurred and his copper bones went numb.
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Stony Brook was Sandy's original haunt.
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The wooden rake is the weapon wielded by Pigsy.
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The dragon-horse is the T'ang Priest's mount—a dragon transformed into a horse by Kuan-yin.
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The rebukes of Wine Thief, Elixir Stealer, and Ginseng Robber allude to several of Monkey's escapades earlier in
Journey to the West.