Chinese Fairy Tales and Fantasies (Pantheon Fairy Tale and Folklore Library) (25 page)

As he grew into a young dog, excrement and urine seemed fragrant to him, but he knew that they were filthy and made up his mind not to eat any. He spent a year as a dog in a state of constant fury, wanting only to die. Yet he was afraid to escape this life. Since the master fed him well and showed no wish to slaughter him for food, he purposely bit him in the leg, tearing the flesh; and the master clubbed him to death.

This rash deed angered the king of the dead, and he ordered Mr. Liu whipped with hundreds of strokes. Then he turned him into a snake and confined him to a secluded room so dark that he never saw the sky. Frustrated, Mr. Liu scaled a wall and escaped through a hole. He looked at himself and found that he was on his belly in the lush grass—strange but true, a snake!

He swore that he would harm no living thing but would satisfy his hunger with fruits and vegetables. For more than a year he lived in this way, pining to kill himself but understanding that it would be unwise, just as it would be unwise for him to injure someone and get himself killed. He could not find a suitable way to die. One day as he was lying in the grass, he heard a carriage coming and rushed into the road in front of it. The wheels crushed him and cut him in two.

His speedy return amazed the king of the dead. The snake lay prostrate and told his story. The king, because the creature had been innocent when killed, forgave him and judged that he had fulfilled his sentence and could be reborn human. And so he became the scholar Liu who begins our story.

When Mr. Liu was born, he could speak. He could recite literary works, essays, and histories after only one reading, and soon
he earned his advanced degree. Yet he was always urging people to put a thick pad under their horse’s saddle, for a heel dug into the flank is worse punishment for a horse than the whip.

The Recorder of Things Strange says: Creatures with fur or horns include princes and lords. This is so, just as there are things furred or horned among princes and lords. For the lowly to do good deeds is like planting a tree to produce flowers. For the noble to do good deeds is like nourishing a tree that has already blossomed. What is planted should grow larger; what is nourished should last long. Otherwise, one hauls the salt wagon and suffers the fetters as a horse, or feeds on filth only to be cut up and cooked as a dog, or, clad in scales, dies in the claws of crane or stork as a snake.

—
P’u Sung-ling

Having led a life of lofty purity, a certain monk from Everclear in Shantung province was still hale at the age of eighty. But one day he fell over and did not rise. Although the monks of the temple rushed to his aid, he had already passed into the world beyond.

The monk himself, unaware that he was dead, floated away with his soul intact until he reached the faraway borders of Honan province. In Honan at that moment, a young man of the upper classes was leading a team of horsemen who were using hawks to hunt for hares. His horse bolted, and the young man fell off and died. By chance his soul encountered that of the old monk, and the two joined as one.

After a while the young man gradually recovered consciousness. His servants surrounded him solicitously as he opened his eyes and asked, “How did I get here?” They helped him home, where an assembly of beautiful women greeted him with expressions of concern. “I am a monk!” he cried. “What am I doing here?” The members of the household thought he had lost his mind and earnestly tried to make him understand that he had been in an accident. The monk made no further attempt to explain himself; he simply shut his eyes and would not speak again.

They fed him husked rice, which he took; but he refused both wine and meat. At night he slept alone and would not accept the services of wife or concubine. After a few days he thought of going for a short walk. Everyone was delighted. He stepped out, but when he paused for a moment, a stream of attendants approached him with financial accounts to check over. He refused to deal with these matters, claiming that he was still too weak from his illness. All he said was, “In Shantung there is an Everclear county. Do you know of it?” The attendants replied that they did, and he said, “I feel depressed and at a loss for anything to do. It would please me to go there for a visit; let’s get ready now.” His servants said that he had just recovered and was not well enough for a long trip, but he would not listen.

The next day he set out. When he arrived in Everclear, the place was as he remembered it. Without asking the way he went directly to the monastery, and the disciples greeted their distinguished guest with deference. “Where has your old monk gone to?” he asked. They replied, “Our master has gone the way of all things.” The visitor asked where the grave was, and the puzzled
disciples led him to a solitary three-foot mound not yet overgrown with wild grass.

Soon the young man mounted his horse for the return journey. “Your master was a monk of discipline, and the order that he established here should not be disturbed,” he told them. The monks nodded continuously as he left.

Back in his household, the young man’s mind went dead as ash. He sat in meditation like a withered tree, refusing to attend to any family responsibilities. And after several months he walked out of the house and disappeared.

He returned to the old monastery and said to the disciples, “I am none other than your master.” Thinking him demented, the monks looked at one another and laughed. But when he told them the circumstances of his return to life, and when he spoke of events during the old monk’s lifetime, everything tallied. The monks believed him and installed him in his former quarters, serving him as they always had.

The young man’s family discovered where he was and often sent horse and carriage to the monastery with an earnest appeal for him to come home. He paid no attention to them. After a year his wife sent his steward to the monastery with many gifts, but he refused all the gold and silk and accepted only a single cloth robe. Friends who came to the district called on him to pay their respects and found him reticent and wise for his years. Though he was only thirty, he could vividly describe the events of eight decades.

The Recorder of Things Strange says: When a man dies, his spirit disperses. If a spirit should travel a thousand leagues and still remain whole, it is because that soul’s nature is unalterable. It is not astonishing that such a strong-minded monk should come back to life; it is more surprising that on entering a state of magnificent luxury, he was still able to sever his ties and turn from the world. How different from those ordinary men who fall in the twinkling of an eye and stain their moral record so deeply that they’d be better off dead!

—
P’u Sung-ling

When a man named Chang died suddenly, an underworld officer took him down to see the king of the dead. The king checked the records and was angry to learn that the officer had made a false arrest. He ordered the ghost to take Chang back to the living.

When Chang was released, he persuaded the ghost to let him see the prisons of hell. The ghost led him through the Nine Abysses, the Hill of Knives, and the Sword Trees, pointing out each thing of note. Toward the end of the tour they came to a place where a monk was hanging head down, legs bound and laced with ropes. The monk howled with pain, as if he were about to die. As he drew closer Chang saw that it was his own elder brother. Horrified and anguished, Chang asked the ghost what crimes the monk was suffering for.

“This one was a Buddhist monk,” said the ghost. “He was taking money from all sides to pay for women and gambling. That’s why we’ve punished him. We won’t let him down till he repents.”

Then Chang came back to life and began to wonder if his brother had already died. To find out, he hurried to his brother’s home in the Temple of Blessings. He entered the gates and heard howls of pain. In one of the rooms he found his brother, whose legs, covered with welts, were propped against a wall and oozing blood and pus. Chang asked his brother why he kept his legs in that position.

“For relief,” replied the monk. “Otherwise the pain goes right through me.” Then Chang told him what he had seen in the world of the dead. The monk was terrified and not only abandoned
his major vices but even forswore meat and wine. He recited sutras and mantras with great reverence. Within two weeks he was well again and thereafter became a model of self-discipline.

The Recorder of Things Strange says: Hell, or the dungeons of the dead, is a myth, never verified. At least, men of vicious character justify themselves by saying that there is no punishment for our misdeeds. What they fail to understand is that the disasters which strike us in our own daylight world are the punishment of the Unseen.

—
P’u Sung-ling

Ch’en Tsai-heng of my city was sixty years old, a gentle, genial, and humorous man. He was walking at day’s end on the outskirts of the city when he saw two men carrying a fire in a lantern. He tried to light his pipe from the fire but could not manage it. One of the men said to him, “Have you passed your first ‘post mortem’ week yet?” Amazed, Ch’en replied simply, “Not yet.”