Reading Notes: The Monkey King, Part A

(The Waterfall via Wikimedia Commons)

-Island called the Mountain of Flowers and Fruits

-High rock

-there was a seed that basically had the power of the big bang?

-An ape hatched from a stone egg

-The ape grew up and came across a waterfall with the other apes

-competition to see who could face their way through the waterfall and the winner would be king

-Stone ape became the king

-300 hundred years passed

-The apes started sobbing about death

-Three beings were exempt from dead: the Buddhas, the blessed spirits and the gods

-The king was going to search for them, sailing through the Great Sea

-Came across a wood-chopper at work

-The master named him Sun Wu Kung

-The Master gave him a riddle to solve

-Sun Wu Kung wanted the Master to teach him grace and the way to eternal life

-He learned transforming arts and wanted to show it to his disciples

-This angered the Master so he treated Sun Wu Kung that if he did not keep his secret, he would lock his soul in hell

-Sun Wu Kung returned back home 

-The Devil-King of Chaos came

-Then the Dragon-King came

-Then the Dragon-Queen and her daughter came out

-To be continued....

Bibliography: "The Monkey King" from R. Wilhelm's Chinese Fairy Book; link to the reading online