第五十八回 · 五仙五蟲 Five Immortals And Five Worms — Journey to the West

原文 Original text 繁體 Traditional Reader's edition

五仙五蟲 Five Immortals And Five Worms

如rú來lái才cái道dào：「周zhōu天tiān之zhī內nèi有yǒu五wǔ仙xiān：乃nǎi天tiān、地dì、神shén、人rén、鬼guǐ。有yǒu五wǔ蟲chóng：乃nǎi蠃luǒ、鱗lín、毛máo、羽yǔ、昆kūn。這zhè廝sī非fēi天tiān、非fēi地dì、非fēi神shén、非fēi人rén、非fēi鬼guǐ，亦yì非fēi蠃luǒ、非fēi鱗lín、非fēi毛máo、非fēi羽yǔ、非fēi昆kūn。又yòu有yǒu四sì猴hóu混hùn世shì，不bú入rù十shí類lèi之zhī種zhǒng。」如rú来lái才cái道dào：「周zhōu天tiān之zhī内nèi有yǒu五wǔ仙xiān：乃nǎi天tiān、地dì、神shén、人rén、鬼guǐ。有yǒu五wǔ虫chóng：乃nǎi蠃luǒ、鳞lín、毛máo、羽yǔ、昆kūn。这zhè厮sī非fēi天tiān、非fēi地dì、非fēi神shén、非fēi人rén、非fēi鬼guǐ，亦yì非fēi蠃luǒ、非fēi鳞lín、非fēi毛máo、非fēi羽yǔ、非fēi昆kūn。又yòu有yǒu四sì猴hóu混hùn世shì，不bú入rù十shí类lèi之zhī种zhǒng。」

逐句解 Line by line

如rú來lái才cái道dào：「周zhōu天tiān之zhī內nèi有yǒu五wǔ仙xiān：乃nǎi天tiān、地dì、神shén、人rén、鬼guǐ。如rú来lái才cái道dào：「周zhōu天tiān之zhī内nèi有yǒu五wǔ仙xiān：乃nǎi天tiān、地dì、神shén、人rén、鬼guǐ。

The Tathāgata then said: "Within the whole heavens there are five sorts of immortal: the heavenly, the earthly, the divine, the human and the ghostly.

五仙 — the standard Daoist fivefold classification, which the novel has already put in Diting's mouth at blk15.

有yǒu五wǔ蟲chóng：乃nǎi蠃luǒ、鱗lín、毛máo、羽yǔ、昆kūn。有yǒu五wǔ虫chóng：乃nǎi蠃luǒ、鳞lín、毛máo、羽yǔ、昆kūn。

There are five sorts of worm: the shelled, the scaled, the hairy, the feathered and the insect.

五蟲 — 蟲 in its old wide sense of 'creature', not merely insects. The two pentads together exhaust the ten classes of living thing.

這zhè廝sī非fēi天tiān、非fēi地dì、非fēi神shén、非fēi人rén、非fēi鬼guǐ，亦yì非fēi蠃luǒ、非fēi鱗lín、非fēi毛máo、非fēi羽yǔ、非fēi昆kūn。这zhè厮sī非fēi天tiān、非fēi地dì、非fēi神shén、非fēi人rén、非fēi鬼guǐ，亦yì非fēi蠃luǒ、非fēi鳞lín、非fēi毛máo、非fēi羽yǔ、非fēi昆kūn。

This fellow is not heavenly, not earthly, not divine, not human, not ghostly; neither is he shelled, nor scaled, nor hairy, nor feathered, nor insect.

Ten negations in twenty-three graphs, running the two pentads through in the same order they were given. The form is an exhaustive elimination.

又yòu有yǒu四sì猴hóu混hùn世shì，不bú入rù十shí類lèi之zhī種zhǒng。」又yòu有yǒu四sì猴hóu混hùn世shì，不bú入rù十shí类lèi之zhī种zhǒng。」

There are also four monkeys that confound the world, not entering into the kinds of the ten classes."

混世 'to confound the world', to move through it out of order. 十類之種 zhǒng — the ten classes just enumerated.

總評 Commentary

The Buddha answers by taxonomy, and the method is the point. He does not look at the two Pilgrims. He recites the complete inventory of living kinds — five immortals, five worms — and then eliminates all ten, one by one, in the order given. The impostor is identified by exclusion from a list, which is precisely the operation the Register of Life and Death failed to perform two blocks earlier.

The tenfold negation is the chapter's rhetorical high point and it is built out of nothing but the particle 非 repeated ten times. Nothing is described; everything is denied. After five courts of trying to say what the creature is, the resolution begins by establishing exhaustively what it is not.

又有四猴混世，不入十類之種 then opens a gap in the system the Buddha has just closed. Four monkeys exist outside the ten classes — which means the taxonomy everyone else was working with was incomplete, and that is why no court could place him. The failure was never of perception. It was of the catalogue.