原文 Original text
繁體 Traditional
Reader's edition
含詞賦 With rhapsody
代供訴冤
A Deposition in Verse, Telling the Wrong
好大聖，趨步上前，對怪物厲聲高叫道：「陛下，這老道是一個瘖啞之人，卻又有些耳聾。只因他年幼間曾走過西天，認得道路。他的一節兒起落根本，我盡知之，望陛下寬恕，待我替他供罷。」魔王道：「趁早實實的替他供來，免得取罪。」行者道：好大圣，趋步上前，对怪物厉声高叫道：「陛下，这老道是一个瘖哑之人，却又有些耳聋。只因他年幼间曾走过西天，认得道路。他的一节儿起落根本，我尽知之，望陛下宽恕，待我替他供罢。」魔王道：「趁早实实的替他供来，免得取罪。」行者道：
「供罪行童年且邁，痴聾瘖啞家私壞。「供罪行童年且迈，痴聋瘖哑家私坏。
祖居原是此間人，五載之前遭破敗。祖居原是此间人，五载之前遭破败。
天無雨，民乾壞，君王黎庶都齋戒。天无雨，民干坏，君王黎庶都斋戒。
焚香沐浴告天公，萬里全無雲靉靆。焚香沐浴告天公，万里全无云叆叇。
百姓饑荒若倒懸，鍾南忽降全真怪。百姓饥荒若倒悬，钟南忽降全真怪。
呼風喚雨顯神通，然後暗將他命害。呼风唤雨显神通，然后暗将他命害。
推下花園天井中，陰侵龍位人難解。推下花园天井中，阴侵龙位人难解。
幸吾來，功果大，起死回生無罣礙。幸吾来，功果大，起死回生无罣碍。
情願皈依作行童，與僧同去朝西界。情愿皈依作行童，与僧同去朝西界。
假變君王是道人，道人轉是真王代。」假变君王是道人，道人转是真王代。」
逐句解 Line by line
好大聖，趨步上前，對怪物厲聲高叫道：「陛下，這老道是一個瘖啞之人，卻又有些耳聾。
好大圣，趋步上前，对怪物厉声高叫道：「陛下，这老道是一个瘖哑之人，却又有些耳聋。
The fine Great Sage stepped briskly forward and cried out sharply to the monster: "Your Majesty, this old Daoist is a mute, and moreover somewhat deaf.
瘖啞之人 = "a dumb man"; 耳聾 = "deaf." Wukong invents an infirmity so the disguised king need not speak.
只因他年幼間曾走過西天，認得道路。
只因他年幼间曾走过西天，认得道路。
It's only that in his young years he once travelled through to the Western Heaven, and knows the roads.
認得道路: 得 = dé ("to know, recognize"). 年幼間: 間 = jiān.
他的一節兒起落根本，我盡知之，望陛下寬恕，待我替他供罷。」
他的一节儿起落根本，我尽知之，望陛下宽恕，待我替他供罢。」
The whole rise and fall of his affair I know entirely; I beg Your Majesty's indulgence, and will testify for him."
一節兒: suffix 兒 = er ("the whole matter"). 盡知之: 盡 = jìn ("know entirely"). 替他供: 供 = gòng; final 罷 = ba.
魔王道：「趁早實實的替他供來，免得取罪。」
魔王道：「趁早实实的替他供来，免得取罪。」
The demon-king said: "Testify for him at once, truly, and spare yourself a charge."
免得取罪: 得 = de ("so as to avoid"). 替他供來: 供 = gòng.
行者道：
行者道：
Pilgrim said:
The narrator's tag introducing the verse deposition; the couplet is spliced off at the colon (：).
「供罪行童年且邁，痴聾瘖啞家私壞。
「供罪行童年且迈，痴聋瘖哑家私坏。
The accused acolyte is a man far gone in years, / dull, deaf, dumb and mute, his fortunes wrecked.
First line of the verse deposition (供狀). 供罪: 供 = gòng ("to depose to a charge"). The whole is a testimony in rhyme that tells the true story under cover of a fiction.
祖居原是此間人，五載之前遭破敗。
祖居原是此间人，五载之前遭破败。
His forebears' home was here in this very land; / five years ago it met with ruin.
此間人: 間 = jiān. 五載: 載 = zǎi (the literary "year"), as with 三載 in Ch.38. 遭破敗 = "met disaster."
天無雨，民乾壞，君王黎庶都齋戒。
天无雨，民干坏，君王黎庶都斋戒。
Heaven sent no rain, the people parched and failing; / king and commons, all kept the fast.
民乾壞: 乾 = gān ("dry, parched"). 都齋戒: 都 = dōu. 黎庶 = "the common folk."
焚香沐浴告天公，萬里全無雲靉靆。
焚香沐浴告天公，万里全无云叆叇。
Burning incense, bathing, they prayed to the Lord of Heaven; / ten thousand li, and never a cloud of overcast.
萬里: 里 = lǐ (untranslated unit). 靉靆 (ài dài) = a rhyming binome, "thick with cloud."
百姓饑荒若倒懸，鍾南忽降全真怪。
百姓饥荒若倒悬，钟南忽降全真怪。
The people, famished, hung as if head-down; / from Zhongnan there suddenly came down a Quanzhen fiend.
倒懸: 倒 = dào ("hung upside-down," i.e. in dire straits). 忽降: 降 = jiàng ("descended"). 鍾南 = Mt. Zhongnan; 全真 = the Quanzhen Daoist order.
呼風喚雨顯神通，然後暗將他命害。
呼风唤雨显神通，然后暗将他命害。
He summoned wind and called up rain to show his powers, / and then in secret did the king to death.
暗將他命害: disposal coverb 將 = jiāng ("took his life and destroyed it"). 顯神通 = "displayed his magic arts."
推下花園天井中，陰侵龍位人難解。
推下花园天井中，阴侵龙位人难解。
Shoved him down into the garden's sky-well, / usurped the dragon-throne — a wrong none could unriddle.
天井中: 中 = zhōng. 陰侵龍位 = "secretly encroached on the dragon-throne." 人難解: 難 = nán.
幸吾來，功果大，起死回生無罣礙。
幸吾来，功果大，起死回生无罣碍。
Happily I came, and my merit was great: / raising the dead to life, with never a hindrance.
幸吾來 = "luckily I came." 起死回生 = "to raise the dead." 罣礙 (guà ài) = obstruction, hindrance (a Buddhist term).
情願皈依作行童，與僧同去朝西界。
情愿皈依作行童，与僧同去朝西界。
Willingly he takes refuge as an acolyte, / to go with the monks toward the Western realm.
皈依作行童: 行 = xíng ("acolyte"). 朝西界: 朝 = cháo ("toward").
假變君王是道人，道人轉是真王代。」
假变君王是道人，道人转是真王代。」
The false-changed king is the Daoist himself; / the Daoist, in turn, stands in the true king's stead.
假變君王是道人 = "the one falsely transformed into king is the Daoist." 道人轉是真王代: 轉 = zhuǎn ("in turn"); 代 = "stands in for." The deposition names the usurpation outright, in the fiend's own hearing.
總評 Commentary
This is the chapter's cleverest set-piece: a deposition in verse (供狀) that tells the exact truth of the usurpation while passing, to the fiend on the throne, as the routine testimony of a mute acolyte's minder. Wukong first disarms scrutiny by declaring the disguised king deaf and dumb — so that he need not, and cannot, be made to speak — and then "testifies" in his place, in ten rhymed lines that lay out the whole crime: the three-year drought, the Quanzhen fiend come down from Zhongnan, the king murdered and thrown down the garden well, the dragon-throne usurped, and the rescue by the elixir.
The audacity is the point. Line by line the verse says what everyone in the hall would be executed for saying in prose — "the false-changed king is the Daoist; the Daoist stands in the true king's stead" — and the impostor, unable to break the frame of a formal deposition without betraying himself, must sit and hear his own crime recited to his face. The device is a favourite of the vernacular novel, which loves a truth spoken safely inside a fiction; here it also tightens the screw, since the fiend now knows that Wukong knows, and the open fight can only be moments away.