试问禅关，参求无数，往往到头虚老。
If you try to ask about the dhyana Or investigate the innumerable You will waste your life and achieve nothing.
毛吞大海，芥纳须弥，金色头陀微笑。
A hair can contain an ocean, A mustard-seed can hold a mountain, And the golden Kasyapa only smiles.
悟时超十地三乘，凝滞了四生六道。
When you are awakened you will surpass the Ten Stages and the Three Vehicles, And stop the four kinds of birth and the six types of reincarnation.
谁听得绝想崖前，无阴树下，杜宇一声春晓？
Who has ever heard, before the cliff of thoughts extinguished, Under the tree that has no shadow, The sound of the cuckoo in a spring dawn?”
曹溪路险，暨岭云深，此处故人音沓。
The path by the Cao Stream is dangerous, The Vulture Peak is high in the clouds: Here the voice of the ancients was a mystery.
千丈冰崖，五叶莲开，古殿帘垂香袅。
On a cliff ten thousand feet high Five-leaved lotuses bloom As scent coils round the shutters of the old palace.
那时节，识破源流，便见龙王三宝。
At that time Your knowledge smashes all the currents of thought; The Dragon King and the Three Treasures can be seen.
这一篇词，名《苏武慢》。
This lyric poem is set to the tune Su Wu Man.
话表我佛如来，辞别了玉帝，回至雷音宝刹，但见那三千诸佛、五百阿罗、八大金刚、无边菩萨，一个个都执着幢幡宝盖，异宝仙花，摆列在灵山仙境．婆罗双林之下接迎。
Our story goes on to how our Buddha, the Tathagata, left the Jade Emperor and went back to the Thunder Monastery, where he saw the three thousand Buddhas, five hundred Arhats, eight great Vajrapanis and countless Bodhisattvas standing under the pairs of sala trees at the foot of the Vulture Peak, all holding banners, canopies, jewels and magical flowers.
如来驾住祥云，对众道：§ “我以甚深般苦，遍现三界。
The Tathagata brought his propitious cloud to a halt and addressed them thus: “With my deep insight I surveyed the Three Worlds.
根本性原，毕竟寂灭。
The origin of nature Is ultimately emptiness,
同虚空相，一无所有。
Like the great void, Containing nothing at all.
殄伏乖猴．是事莫识。
The subjection of this evil monkey Was a mystery beyond understanding.
名生死始，法相如是。”
It is called the beginning of life and death: Such is the appearance of things.”
说罢，放舍利之光，满空有白虹四十二道，南北通连。
When he had spoken a sacred light filled the sky with forty-two rainbows that linked North and South together.
大众见了，皈身礼拜。
All who saw them bowed,
少顷间，聚庆云彩雾，登上品莲台，端然坐下。
and a moment later the Buddha gathered together some felicitous cloud and climbed to the supreme Lotus Throne, where he seated himself in majesty.
那三千诸佛、五百罗汉、八金刚、四菩萨合掌近前礼毕，问日：“闹天宫搅乱皤桃者，谁也？”
Then the three thousand Buddhas, the five hundred Arhats, the eight Vajrapanis and the four Bodhisattvas came forward to bow to him with their hands together and ask, “Who was it who wrecked the Heavenly Palace and ruined the Peach Banquet?”
如来道：“那厮乃花果山产的一妖猴，罪恶滔天，不可名状。
“The wretch was a monkey fiend born on the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit,” the Buddha replied, “whose towering crimes would beggar description.
概天神将，俱莫能降伏，虽二郎捉获。
None of the heavenly generals were able to subdue him,
我去时，正在雷将中间，扬威耀武，卖弄精神，被我止住兵戈，问他来历。
When I went there he was in the middle of the thunder generals, giving a great display of his martial prowess and his spirit.
I stopped the fighting and asked him what it was all about.
我与他打了个赌赛，他出不得我手，却将他一把抓住，指化五行山，封压他在那里。
I made a wager with him that he could not jump out of my hand, then grabbed him, turned my fingers into the Five Elements Mountain, and sealed him under it.
五帝大开金阙瑶宫，请我坐了首席．立‘安天大会’谢我，却方辞驾而回。”
The Jade Emperor opened wide the golden gates of the Jade Palace, and invited me to be the guest of honour at a Banquet to Celebrate Peace in Heaven he gave to thank me.
After that I took my leave of him and came back here.”
大众听言喜悦，极口称扬。
They were all delighted by the news and they congratulated him effusively,