The Journey to the West is one of China's four classical masterpieces. Among many figures, the Monkey King, one of the four typical figures running through the works, is the most representative, leaving a deep impression on us and is a topic we often comment on. It shows us the process of a hero's growth, from ignorance and spontaneity to breaking into the world, from doing one's own thing to learning from others, and the Monkey King finally grew from an ignorant child to a hero that everyone likes.
The stone that inherited the aura of heaven and earth gave birth to the Monkey King, a "Great Sage in the Heaven" who was determined, diligent, rebellious, fearless, intelligent and aura, helped the poor, and sympathized with the lonely.
In order to seek the Buddha's method of becoming immortal, the Monkey King "traveled all over the world" and "day and night", but after twists and turns, he still adhered to his original belief. After studying as a teacher for several years, Wukong changed his active habits when he was in Huaguoshan, and diligently learned all kinds of manners and words to realize his dreams. Wukong's persistence and diligence have penetrated into his long road of learning arts, and the author Wu Cheng'en is also explaining that the long road of life cannot be smooth sailing, and nothing can be accomplished overnight. Like Wukong, people should make thorough efforts to pursue their ideals.
Wukong, who came to the world alone, had no relatives and no reason, but the author Wu Cheng'en gave Wukong a "vigorous" or even "mysterious" appearance instead of a "sad and melancholy" tone, all of which projected that Wukong was not an ordinary person, but an "idle generation" and "ascended to heaven and entered the earth" in his later appearances. Even if he has mastered a skill, even if he is deviant, he still longs for a place in society. When he learned that Bi was just a dirty little thing, he angrily began his resistance to "the ruling and opposition authorities are vegetarians" and "restricting freedom". He was "superior" but Wukong's resistance was only for the "society" that was not free and unequal, and did not deviate from the "minimum moral standards for being a man". His fearlessness is not the courage and unreasonable troubles of ordinary people, but the fearlessness when he is suppressed and restricted by powerful forces. For example, after he overthrew the blast furnace of Taishang Laojun, he knew that he had made an irreparable mistake because of a moment of anger, and should not transfer his resentment to innocent "loyal subjects"; In the face of evil spirits on the way to learn from the scriptures, he first weighed his own strength, and at the same time, it was more important to fight against evil spirits instead of making unnecessary sacrifices, which showed that Wukong's fearlessness to evil forces was not the courage of ordinary people.
As for Wukong's self-styled "the Monkey King", it can be seen that Wukong is still looking forward to becoming famous in this society. The Jade Emperor seized his "tail" of "seeking utility", hoping to make him submit, but limited the bottom line of his "being a man"-freedom, which made Wukong turn upside down. Fortunately, Wukong has a heart of "being good". On his way to the Western Heaven to learn the scriptures, Wukong met all kinds of evil spirits symbolizing the inevitable "desire" and "evil" in life. Wukong used his "wit" and "courage" to fight against evil forces. For example, he turned into a bug and went deep into the "behind enemy lines" to spy on the "military situation". He turned into a "relative" of evil spirits and has set a magic weapon to subdue evil spirits. Wukong used his "justice" to completely turn human instinct "desire" into ashes. For example, he sets an example, he is not close to women, and he doesn't want wealth. What he hides in his heart is just to cut off the enchanting shadow and protect Master from getting the scriptures smoothly. It's completely different from the flat peach that he ate from the queen mother before studying the classics. Now he has no selfish desires. He cares about the disadvantaged, even if he is thirsty. The most important and precious thing about Wukong is his character of "sincerity" and "kindness" and his creed of "helping the poor, caring for the widowed and caring for the widowed", which makes his noble soul sublimate while saving the world.
Wu Cheng'en's "the Monkey King" is pure and ethereal, although it lacks the inherent weakness of "human". Even though Wukong likes to listen to flattery and is sometimes aggressive, no matter how later readers refute and reject this role, they will eventually affirm Wukong's cleverness and wit in containing demons, his loyalty to Tang Priest's master and disciples, and his kindness and fraternity on the way to learn from the West!
"The demon will be a disaster in the ghost domain." Demons in The Journey to the West are not just the embodiment of general difficulties, but mostly represent some feudal dark forces that are harmful to the people and do evil, and they have certain real contents in real life. In fact, the monsters in Journey to the West are all "special" classes beyond ordinary people. Like immortals, they can live forever and have magic, and the so-called magic here is actually equivalent to the power in reality. They should be regarded as one of the "gods", but they are actually moths in the "gods". Instead of working for the welfare of the people, they often waste people's money and exploit them wantonly. The Monkey King is the bane of these moths. He is never soft on these people. Although often not understood by Tang Priest, he swept them away without hesitation. Even after the event, the "demon" was brought back by the immortal Buddha, and even the Tang Priest was brutally expelled, and the heart of the guard never changed.
From the land of the east to the sky of the west, there are dozens of monster leaders, but he beat the western world with a golden hoop stick, making the monsters tremble with fear. Moreover, most of his struggles with monsters are active attacks. As soon as he heard that monsters disturbed the world, he would never let go. He took Pig in and said to Gao Cai, the guide, "If there are goblins in the future, please make more for me. Thanks." The 67th time, the owner of camel Luo Zhuang asked Wukong to catch the demon, and Wukong immediately sang and said, "Thank you." Pig said aside, "Look at him making trouble! Even his grandfather is not so affectionate when he hears about taking monsters. " It can explain the initiative and enthusiasm of Wukong's struggle. In addition, the author has repeatedly borrowed books from characters and praised the Monkey King for "saving lives from disasters" and "making enemies with the world". On the bank of the Tongtian River, he not only saved the children of two "sacrificed" goblins, but also eliminated the monsters and saved the people who suffered disasters for generations. Stories like The Kingdom of Monks and Zhu Ziguo are all about the Monkey King's initiative to attack and kill people. Every time I catch the monster leader, I always catch all the little monsters, so as not to leave disaster for the people. It can be seen that the Monkey King has broken away from the nature of fighting for himself, but is fighting for the suffering people and the weak.
The essence of the Monkey King's image lies not only in daring to fight, but also in winning by fighting, so it is called "fighting to defeat the Buddha". There are two magic weapons for him to win the struggle: first, his martial arts are high, especially in the heavenly palace catastrophe; One is good at fighting, that is, both wisdom and courage, and fighting with each other. He often turns into a mosquito, a fly and a moth, and drills into goblin caves to find out the details of goblins (such as Huang Fengguai); Or infer the origin of monsters from clues, and then find corresponding countermeasures according to the characteristics of these monsters (such as Huang Paoguai); Sometimes it becomes the husband or wife of the demon to cheat the demon (such as the three-tone banana fan). Or earn the devil's magic weapon and kill monsters (such as stealing purple gold bells). He is also good at subduing goblins (such as the yellow eyebrow monster) by drilling into the enemy's stomach. He is witty and flexible, and he designs everywhere, which often makes monsters hard to prevent.
Finally, the Buddhist scriptures were completed, and all the members of the Buddhist scriptures group completed the positive results. However, it should be noted that the so-called "positive fruit" should be just a metaphor, which does not fully conform to the teachings of Buddhism. Among the five people, what are the basic conditions for the Monkey King to become a Buddha? The Tathagata thinks that the Monkey King became a Buddha because of his "meritorious service in refining demons and subduing demons", so it can be seen that he achieved positive results entirely because of his "meritorious service", that is, he completed the cause of benefiting mankind and made contributions to the human community.
To sum up, we can know that the Monkey King's image has three main characteristics:
The first is his rebellious spirit of daring to struggle and despising all feudal authorities. The Monkey King was originally a stone monkey on Guo Hua Mountain, the pride of Dongsheng Shenzhou. After he was born, he lived a free life in the blessed land of Fairy Mountain, free from the control of Kirin, phoenix and human palace. In the Dragon Palace, he "scared the old dragon king and scared the little dragon out of his wits"; In hades, he made the ten halls of hades bow down. He dared to call himself the Great Sage of the Monkey and shouted the slogan "The emperors take turns to do it and come to my house next year". Make a scene in the Heavenly Palace, and beat those heavenly generals out of the water, which scared the Jade Emperor out of his mind. Hades and heaven, the sacred and inviolable authority of the water world on weekdays, stood before him one by one in complete disgrace. In addition, he dared to call Tathagata the nephew of goblins and Guanyin Bodhisattva "because she has no husband's life". He even despises the king of the world. He said to the infinite king, "If I want to be an emperor, all the emperors in Kyushu have done it." When King Zhu Ziguo was ill, he treated him with horse urine and pills. This rebellious spirit of being lawless and daring to challenge all the authorities of God, Buddha, heaven, earth, water and human beings, and the strong desire to pursue a "free" life are the basic characteristics of the Monkey King's artistic image. This feature embodies the revolutionary spirit and democratic requirements of the people.
Secondly, the Monkey King has a clear love-hate relationship. He hates all goblins and monsters who make waves and harm the people, but he has strong feelings for the suffering people and all good people. As all the monks in Chechi Country praised, they devoted themselves to loyalty and justice, shoveling and hoeing human injustice, and "helping the needy and caring for the lonely". He relieved the disaster for 500 innocent monks in Cheqi; In the kingdom of monks, he handed over the essence of White Deer Plain and saved the lives of111children. Killed the leopard essence in Yin Wu Mountain and rescued the poor woodcutter; He adjusted the banana fan three times and put out the fire in the Flame Mountain, which not only opened the way to the west, but also saved the suffering of the local people. He always makes compromises with Tang Priest. Even if he is wronged, he still tries his best to learn from the scriptures. He always takes good care of Tang Priest. Although he satirizes Zhu Bajie from time to time and sometimes plays tricks on him, he is well-intentioned in order to maintain the unity of the Buddhist team. However, he showed no mercy to evil spirits. When he was in Monkey King Thrice Defeats the Skeleton Demon, although Tang Priest's magic gave him a splitting headache and even stopped him by cutting off the friendship between master and apprentice, he still couldn't shake his determination to get rid of evil. This feature of the Monkey King's image has entrusted the ancient people with the firm determination to unite and strive for their own liberation.
Thirdly, the Monkey King also has extraordinary wisdom, extraordinary talent, insight into everything, and a clear head. He learned the superb skills of seventy-two changes and somersaults from the bodhi ancestor, gained sharp eyes in the blast furnace of Taishang Laojun, and got a golden hoop from the Dragon King, so he has the power to subdue demons. He won't let his guard down or use his head because he is proficient. On the contrary, he can keenly find doubts in extremely complicated situations, get to the bottom of it and expose the disguise of demons. He is good at observing and understanding, often looking for local mountain gods to inquire about the situation, or observing the movement with critical eyes, or turning into a small flying insect to spy on the truth inside the enemy. He is also good at using all kinds of clever tactics to defeat the devil, or get into the devil's stomach, or become the devil's relatives and friends, or seize their magic weapons, or destroy their nests. He is always invincible. The Monkey King's art of struggle embodies the rich experience and outstanding wisdom of ancient people, and it is still enlightening and instructive to people today.
Finally, the Monkey King has the determination and diligence to study. Although the Monkey King studied hard and learned from Bodhi, he could not change his innate nature. Including his perseverance and diligence in school. After living in Huaguoshan for a period of time, he was promoted to the Monkey King because he entered water curtain cave for the first time. From then on, with his own wisdom, he realized that it was hard to escape from birth, illness and death, and suddenly he had the desire to learn to live forever. When the old monkey told him that there were buddhas, immortals and ways to live forever, he was filled with joy. In fact, this also has the characteristics of willfulness. The Monkey King is a person who thinks about it. This stone monkey, which has no name yet, has embarked on the road of studying and visiting Taoism. After many years, his footprints are everywhere, which shows his mind. Facing the tortuous road, he didn't give up. Finally, I learned about Bodhi's ancestral home from the woodcutter and went to study. On that day, the ancestors asked him where he came from. When talking about the way of studying, the stone monkey said, "I traveled across the ocean and traveled around the world, and I came here with more than a dozen ideas." The hardships and sincerity of learning moved even the founder of Bodhi, and finally he was accepted as an apprentice. After learning from my ancestors, I tried my best to avoid impatience as soon as I got rid of the habit of being active. At first, apart from learning etiquette and basic knowledge, I always did chores, but I persisted for six or seven years without complaining. So the ancestors inquired about all kinds of doorways and chose whatever they liked to learn. In the end, the stone monkey saw through the hints of his ancestors with his unique intelligence and understanding, and finally learned two stunts: seventy-two changes and somersault cloud. It was three years later. Since then, he has studied abroad for nearly twenty years.
In the Heavenly Palace Catastrophe, the son of nature, born with "innocent show and bright moonlight", has the characteristics of "willful behavior" from beginning to end. He lacked the basic knowledge and understanding of the hierarchy of the theocracy world and the most basic order principle of the society at that time. During his tenure in the Heavenly Palace, he did his duty until he learned that Bi was an inexperienced junior official, which led him to the Heavenly Palace. After becoming the Great Sage of Qitian, he still "doesn't know his rank, doesn't care about his salary, and only remembers his name." The jade emperor put him in charge of the flat peach garden, and he was single-minded and conscientious. He stole the flat peach only because he saw "the branches of the old tree are half ripe." He wants to taste something new in his heart. "The monkey's nature is to eat ripe peaches. Later, the queen mother held a flat peach party and didn't invite him. He couldn't stand it. So he forged an imperial edict to cheat the barefoot immortal, stole the fruit, royal wine, and the old gentleman elixir. It's nothing more than being angry and very casual. After he was taken back to heaven and escaped from the gossip furnace, he openly proposed that "the emperor will take turns to do it and come to my house next year." In fact, this is not a slogan, but because his freedom is limited by the rules of heaven, which gives birth to an anger. In fact, this is not a political requirement, and it is not the heroic spirit of "the strong should respect me, and the hero dares to fight for the first place". Just angry language after being suppressed. So making a scene in the Heavenly Palace is not a purposeful and planned action against the rulers of the Heavenly Palace. The Monkey King's spontaneous and free personality and the ruling order of theocracy world can't coexist, so we have to fight. In the whole struggle, he showed his wayward characteristics.
The Monkey King's quality has created a lifetime reputation, and the world is full of praise.
"The fairy stone explodes the monkey" becomes a much-told story, and the Monkey King in the cave is the hero of the "Monkey King". The birth of the legendary "fairy stone monkey" not only tells us that this is a pure natural life, but also indicates that there will be some strange life experiences and vigorous actions in the future.
From an ordinary stone monkey to the "Huaguoshan water curtain cave" with a bronze head of 84,000, the Monkey King was neither an act of God nor a hypocritical fraud, but a real skill and kung fu. His courage and wit can be seen in the discovery that "the land of flowers and fruits is blessed, and the land of water curtain cave is a hole": from the time he was "king" and "king" returned, what he deserved in return could not be concealed was his fierce and aggressive stubbornness, which was also the proper performance of a typical young hero "the Monkey King". The innate superiority of the "fairy stone monkey" made him pretentious. Despite the ups and downs of his life, his heroism has never been worn away by difficulties.
The strong will honor me, and the heroes only dare to compete for the first place-the hero in the Monkey King. Life will always move forward, and life will move from ignorance to new life. For the Monkey King, who is still the Monkey King, his thoughts have already surpassed the age limit. The progress of thought made his life mature day by day, which opened the door for his smooth transition from the Monkey King to the Monkey King. This is a sense of life, paving the way for his rebellious spirit of challenging tradition, despising powerful people and confronting the world. At this time, the Monkey King has grown into an indomitable spirit.
The Buddhist scriptures in the Western Heaven show a hero, and his achievements are successful and beautiful-the hero who fought against the Buddha (talking about fighting against the Buddha). "Once you fall, you learn." The Monkey King has been at the foot of Wuxing Mountain for 500 years. What is this, 500 years? Being alone, I live a hard life of "thirsty for copper juice" and "hungry for iron bullets". This kind of suffering is not so much a punishment as a deterrent to his frivolous personality, but also a tempering of his personality and humanity. It is a good opportunity for self-awareness and repositioning. This is not only a necessary process in his life journey, but also implies that he will make amazing moves in the future. As Mencius said, "Therefore, the sky will come to Sri Lanka, and we must first suffer from its mind, work hard on its bones and muscles, starve its body, and mess with its actions, so we must be patient and get what it can't do." "Learning from the West" is the lofty ideal and just cause pursued by the Monkey King all his life. From "making trouble in Heaven" to "learning from the West", from "the Monkey King" who is known as a hero to "fighting Buddha", Sun, who was once arrogant, has now grown into a mature hero. This is the perfection of heroic character and the sublimation of the beauty of human nature. "Persistent pursuit of ideals, perseverance, unswerving commitment to the cause and indomitable spirit" is the core of heroism at this stage, and it is also a brilliant reappearance from life consciousness to life self-action.
From "the Monkey King" to "Monkey King" and then to "Fighting Buddha", the Monkey King went through an extraordinary battle course in his life. From "spontaneous" to "conscious" and then to "conscious", we have seen the growth process of a generation of heroes, and their heroic images have profound connotations.
The Monkey King, who has personality, ideal, ability and character, writes the song of justice with courage and persistence.
(A) the embodiment of the author's ideal
The Monkey King is a hero carefully created by the author in The Journey to the West, so he pinned his ideal pursuit on him. The reason why the author emphasizes color so much is because "if the hero can regain his income, he will go to the West in the year of pilgrimage" (the last sentence of the seventh time). The Monkey King was crushed under the Five Elements Mountain. The author praised his rebellious spirit, called him a "hero", and then historically arranged for him to endure the hardships of natural disasters, thus "worshiping Buddha and going to the Western Ocean", which "metaphorically" Wu Cheng'en's pursuit of the ideal person in his mind, which means that the author hopes to cultivate an ideal personality in society in order to achieve national and world peace. It shows that he is eager to combine the realization of self-worth with the realization of social value in the Monkey King, thus placing his beautiful social life ideal.
(2) Confucian historical view of heroic achievements.
The author lived in the Ming dynasty, where feudalism was unified, and Confucianism was orthodox and mainstream. As a feudal intellectual, he not only hated this decadent system, but also deeply reflected on it. However, the "heroic concept" advocated by Confucianism is deeply rooted in his heart. "Self-cultivation, keeping the family in order, governing the country and leveling the world" is the iron law to realize his life ideal. Since the Monkey King is an ideal figure representing the author's will, whether this ideal personality can stand the test of the times and society must be answered from practice. Learning from the West is a sacred and great cause, and it is also a journey specially arranged by the author for the Monkey King to sharpen his mind and cultivate his morality. This is a process that the Monkey King must go through. Whoever can stand the test, fight to the end and win the final victory is a "hero" and a real "achievement". It is recognized by the society, thus laying a solid foundation for "ruling the country and leveling the world" in the future.
(3) The author's heroic ideal and the political reality of opposing corruption and darkness.
In the preface of Yu Zhi Ding, the author said: "My title is Zhi Guai, and I don't specialize in ghosts. There are also warnings from time to time. " It can be seen that it is the genius of the author to "warn" the reality with myths. Journey to the West is a ghost novel. The long panorama of The Journey to the West described by the author through extraordinary imagination, magical exaggeration and grotesque deformation is a profound reflection of social reality. On the way to the west, in addition to encountering monsters who make waves at the evil end, we also experienced three places: Baoxiang, Wuji, Chechi, Xiliang, Bhikkhu, Banfa, Sacrifice, Zhuzi and Tianzhu, and Fengxian and Jinping in Yuhua Prefecture. In these countries and places, goblins are rampant because of "political chaos." "Wen is not wise, Wu is not good, and Jun is not wise." All this is a bold exposure and reflection on the ugly and dark reality of the downfall of the dynasty in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the autocratic eunuch and the rampant spy. The chaotic situation of "the national situation is in danger" is bound to create a heroic image like "the Monkey King" in the author's works. This is the urgent need of the times, calling for such an ideal hero to purify the world, clean up the roots and save the country and the people.
(D) the origin of historical heroes
The Monkey King is a mythical hero, and his miraculous powers are "beyond our reach". But the Monkey King is a trinity of God, man and thing. In the Buddhist scriptures, the author pays attention to him as a typical "human hero", thus making his image cordial and touching. The author's portrayal of heroes is not fabricated out of thin air, but is internally related and unified with those literary works that record and praise heroes in history. In Journey to the West, the Monkey King also worshipped Master to rescue him from Wuxing Mountain (the Monkey King only worshipped three people in his life: Guanyin, the founder of Bodhi, and Tang Priest). The interweaving of "the life of teaching the Tao" and "the grace of father's love" made him wholeheartedly protect the Buddhist scriptures of Tang Priest. Eighty-one difficulties, a journey of 108 thousand miles, fourteen years of cold and hot spring and autumn, perseverance and loyalty.
With the banner of market economy flying high, various decadent feudal ideas emerge one after another. Coupled with the infiltration and infiltration of western cultural ideas, the system itself is imperfect and imperfect, all kinds of evil forces are rampant, and all kinds of ugly phenomena pervade many levels of social life. "Moral decline" and "lack of ideals" also call for the "regeneration" of a heroic image like the Monkey King.
1, dare to fight resolutely against evil forces and have fearless dedication.
On the one hand, we should draw a clear line with it, especially ideologically, and keep a high degree of vigilance, that is, we should not go with the flow, let alone follow the flow. In the struggle strategy, don't try to be brave, but unite with all forces that can be United (the Monkey King often cooperates with Pig Bajie and Friar Sand in the process of exorcism) and make use of all available conditions, especially the strength of the masses, so as to achieve the most effective attack on evil forces. On the one hand, we must fight resolutely and thoroughly and be fearless. We can't give in and compromise. For them, we can only win through struggle, not survive through submission.
2. Have ambition, sentiment, not bound by narrow material desires, and firm belief.
With ambition and lofty pursuit, we can have unparalleled motivation and stimulate our potential. However, the realization of any ideal is not smooth sailing and rising straight, and it must stand the test of the times and society. Sometimes we have to pay a great price, even the price of blood (the Monkey King almost died when he hit Hong Haier), and sometimes we have to resist all kinds of temptations, especially power, beauty and money, in order to be "rock-solid" and not be enslaved by foreign objects. It is impossible without strong will and superhuman perseverance. Sometimes we need to adjust ourselves, change ourselves, overcome ourselves, surpass ourselves, constantly cultivate self-cultivation, and improve and sublimate our humanity and personality. We should rely on a kind of spiritual beauty and light to win our own future and life and win the attention of society.
Of course, there is nothing we can do about the bizarre "inhuman" ability of the Monkey King. But that kind of heroic character and spirit is indeed a fortune that we should carry forward. In such an era of "lack of heroes" and "non-heroes", we need such a "spiritual backbone" to strengthen ourselves, forge ourselves and temper ourselves. Not only us, but also the times.
Legend: the Monkey King became a Buddha because of his great origin. When the goddess filled the sky, he called Lingshi all over the country to sign up. In the end, only the last stone was left. Because this stone has always been around Nu Wa, over time, it naturally produced spirituality. Until one day the stone burst and a stone monkey-the Monkey King appeared. The Monkey King, who made havoc in Heaven and caused such a big disaster, was able to protect Tang Zeng and finally achieved the correct result-fighting Buddha. It is because when he was mending the sky by the goddess, he should have made a positive result like those stones, so the Monkey King made a positive result, and everything was predestined.
Through the analysis of the Monkey King's image, we can learn to be a man, and any difficulties will be solved. In other words, all kinds of difficulties stem from our personality and ideas. The process of overcoming difficulties is the process of overcoming oneself, that is, the process of life growth.
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