Five Elements Mountain

The Water Curtain Cave of Sun Wukong Tang -- [Entrance ] [Monkey Staff Courtyard ] [Library ] [Five Elements Mountain ] [Private Garden Closed]

Read the epic Chinese tale JOURNEY TO THE WEST by Wu Cheng'en (pdf)

After tomorrow – who can say?
Raised to a high-ranking heavenly office,
Listed among the courtiers in the clouds.
The Monkey King was fated to come to Heaven,
Rather than be sullied by the mortal world.
On his body was gleaming golden armour,
On his head a dazzling golden helmet,
In his hand a gold-banded club,
On his feet a pair of cloud-walking shoes to match.
His devil eyes shone like stars,
His ears were long and hard.
His sturdy frame could be transformed at will,
His voice rang clearly as a bell.
The sharp-mouthed Horse Protector with protruding teeth
Wanted to become a Sage Equaling Heaven.
His immortal name was for ever
inscribed in the register of eternal life,
To be transmitted for ten thousand ages, free of the wheel of rebirth.
Many the transformations of the heaven-born Monkey King
Happy in his lair after stealing the pills and wine.
Just because he wrecked the banquet of peaches,
A hundred thousand heavenly troops now spread their nets.
A wicked monkey made chaos, shocking heaven and earth,
So they spread their nets and watched by night and day.

When chaos was first parted the iron was cast:
Yu the Great had the work done himself.
When he unified the depths of rivers, lakes and seas
This cudgel served as a measuring rod.
In the prosperity after mountains and seas had been ordered
It floated to the gates of the Eastern Ocean.
Over the years it gave off a coloured glow,
Learned to shrink and to grow and shine with pure light.
It was my destiny to recover this rod
Which endlessly changes when I say the spell.
When I tell it to grow it fills the universe,
But it can be as tiny as a needle's eye.
It's known as As-You-Will and called gold-banded;
In Heaven and on Earth it is quite unique.
Its weight is thirteen thousand and five hundred pounds;
Whether thick or fine it can bring life or death.
Once it helped me make havoc in Heaven,
And took part when I attacked the Underworld.
It always succeeds in subduing dragons and tigers,
Everywhere wipes out monsters and ogres.
If it points up the sun goes dark;
Heaven, earth, gods, devils, all are afraid.
Passed on by magic since the birth of time,
This is no ordinary piece of iron.

My ancestral home is the Water Curtain Cave
in the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit,
in the land of Aolai in the Eastern Continent of Superior Body.
My father was heaven, my mother earth,
And I was born when a rock split open.
1 took as my master a Taoist adept,
And mastered the Great Way.
Then I returned to my land of immortals,
Where I gathered all of us to live in our cave heaven.
In the ocean's depths I subdued the dragons,
Then climbed the mountains to capture wild beasts.
I removed us from the registers of death,
Put us on the rolls of the living,
And was appointed Great Sage Equaling Heaven.
I enjoyed the heavenly palaces,
And roamed around the splendid buildings.
I met the immortals of Heaven
In daily carousals;
Lived in the holy regions,
Happy every day.
But because I disrupted the Peach Banquet,
And raised a rebellion in the palaces of Heaven,
I was captured by the Lord Buddha
And imprisoned under the Five Elements Mountain.
When hungry I was fed on pellets of iron,
When thirsty I drank molten copper:
For five hundred years I tasted no food or tea.
Fortunately my master came from the East
To worship in the West.
Guanyin told him to deliver me from heavenly disaster.
I was rescued from my torment
To be converted to the Yogacarin sect.
My old name was Wukong;
Now I am known as Sun the Novice.

SUN WUKONGS SCROLL COLLECTION

DAOIST TEXTS
Be inspired with this beautifully presented copy of the Dao-De-Jing by Lao Tzu

Read the ancient Daoist Book of Plain Words Su Shu given by Huang Shih Kung, known as his lordship Yellow-Stone

Enjoy this little Daoist gem The Ch‘ing Ching Ching composed by Lao Chün

Read this short scroll The Ch‘ih Wen Tung The Red-Streaked Cave by an unknown Daoist sage

MAHAYANA SUTRAS
Learn the Prajna Paramita Heart Sutra translated by Ven. Dharma Master Lok To

Read the The Lankavatara Sutra from the original sanskrit

Read the wonderful Dharma Lotus Sutra translated from Chinese during the Yil, Tson Dynasty by Kumarajiva

Enjoy the wonderful narration of the Avalokitesvara-guna-karanda-vyuha Sutra translated during the Song Dynasty by Kustana Tripitaka Master TinSeekJoy

CONFUCIAN TEXTS
Read the sublime wisdom of Lun Yu known as the Analects of Confucius

Here's another great gem the Zhongyong 中庸 or Doctrine of the Mean

Enjoy reading The Great Learning 大學 one of the 4 books of Confucanism

YAOGUAI

Yaoguai (妖怪 pinyin yāo guaì) or yaomo (妖魔 yāo mó) or yaojing (妖精 yāo jīng) is a Chinese term that generally means "demon". Yaoguai are mostly malevolent animal spirits that have acquired magical powers through the practice of Taoism. The evil ones are usually referred to as guai (literally, "freak" or mo, "demon") in Chinese. Their greatest goal is achieving immortality and deification. In Journey to the West, the demons seek this mostly by the abduction and consumption of a holy man (in this case, Tang Sanzang.

Not all yaojing are actually demons; some others are of quite unusual origins. In the case of Bai Gu Jing, she was a skeleton that became such a demon. Many yaojing are fox spirits, or according to the Journey to the West, pets of the deities. They are said to be capable of acquiring human forms, magical powers, and immortality, provided that they receive sufficient energy in such forms as human breath or essence from the moon and the sun. The fox spirits encountered in tales and legends are usually females and appear as young, beautiful women and the nine tailed fox spirit who served Nuwa is one of them. In Journey to the West, Sun Wukong kills this particularly nasty demon. There are also yaoguai kings (mó wáng) that command a number of lessor demon minions.

In Chinese folklore, the Chinese hell Feng Du is a place that is populated by various demonic spawns. Most of these demons are influenced by the Indian Raksasa or Yaksa and therefore bear some similarity with the Japanese Oni and in Japanese, yaoguai are known as Youkai.

Famous yaoguai in Chinese mythology:
* Bai Gu Jing - literally, "white bone spirit"
* Niu Mo Wang - literally, "bull demon king"
* Lady White Snake-a powerful white snake demon who lived near the West Lake in Hangzhou

Sun Wukong uses this term often to insult his demonic adversaries.