Sun Wukong

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Sun Wukong in an illustration for Journey to the West from the 16th century.

Sūn Wùkōng ( Chinese  孫悟空  /  孙悟空 , W.-G. Sun Wu-k'ung ) is the king of the monkeys in the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West . He is an ambivalent supernatural being: "born as a stone egg from a rock, fertilized by the wind, created from the pure essences of heaven, the fine scents of the earth, the power of the sun and the grace of the moon".

history

The monkey king is embedded in an ancient story. In the 7th century the monk Xuanzang set out from China to India to get the Buddha's holy writings for his emperor. The journey lasted sixteen years, and on his return the monk wrote a detailed travel report. This “ journey to the west ” is still one of the most important historical testimonies of life in those early times. Over the centuries, legends and fairy tales have grown up around the pilgrimage of Xuanzang - and one of them is the story of the Monkey King.

Thanks to teaching from various Daoist masters, Sun Wukong not only learns to fight, but also the ability to jump very high and transform in 72 different ways. The Monkey King obtains a staff that can change its size at will, and a cloud on which to fly. “He immediately becomes king, finds a blessed corner of the earth for his people, and holds his daily banquet with pleasure. But he wants more - he wants immortality and the throne of the Jade Emperor . "

He abuses the learned arts for all sorts of pranks. Eventually he conquered the sky alone against the armies of the Jade Emperor and forced them to make him a heavenly god. Even as a god, he continues to play jokes until he is caught by a ruse by the Buddha and held under a mountain for 500 years. For purification, he is finally allowed to accompany the monk Xuanzang on his trip to India , where he is supposed to ask the Buddha for sacred writings for China. Even in the further course of the journey to the west , Sun remains the main character of the novel, although he is the servant of the monk Xuanzang. Almost all problems that the tour group gets into, Sun either solves himself through his intelligence, martial arts and magic powers, or he finds a deity who can help him through his good relationships in heaven.

The Journey to the West can also be read on a philosophical level. On this level, Sun Wukong symbolizes the human heart, which the novel is about to perfect. In the beginning, when Sun conquers the sky, he is selfish and addicted to pleasure, and is very much like the demons he later fights and who stand for difficulties in developing insight and compassion. In the end, however, he becomes a Buddha himself.

reception

With his mixture of impetuous behavior, great courage, strange humor and sometimes surprising wisdom, he is the actual main character of the story and a typical trickster : a cheerful young rebel who cheekily challenges the ossified reign of heaven.

In Asia, the monkey is considered smart, clever, amiable and disrespectful. The monkey king from the legend - whether under the name Sun Wukong in China or Hanuman in India - is a very popular figure to this day. Sun Wukong is one of the most famous mythical creatures, both in China and in Japan, where it is pronounced Son Goku . The latter is also the name of the main character of the Dragon Ball manga or anime.

There are other allusions to the journey to the west z. B. in the mangas Love Hina , Naruto , One Piece and The God of Highschool, as well as in the computer games Brawlhalla, Defense of the Ancients , Diablo 3 , Enslaved: Odyssey to the West , Gods of Rome, Heroes of the Storm , Hyper Universe , League of Legends , Paragon , Smite , Warframe , Warriors Orochi 2, 3 & 4 and AFK Arena.

Movies

Selection of films based on the character Sun Wukong

literature

  • Helwig Schmidt-Glintzer: History of Chinese Literature: From the Beginnings to the Present . CH Beck 1999, ISBN 3-406-45337-6 , p. 435
  • Graham Seal: Encyclopedia of Folk Heroes . ABC-CLIO 2001, ISBN 1-57607-216-9 , p. 176
  • Wha len Lai: From Protean Ape to Handsome Saint: The Monkey King . Asian Folklore Studies, Volume 53, No. 1 (1994), pp. 29-65 ( JSTOR 1178559 )
  • J. Stephen Pearson: THE MONKEY KING IN THE AMERICAN CANON: PATRICIA CHAO AND GERALD VIZENOR'S USE OF AN ICONIC CHINESE CHARACTER . Comparative Literature Studies, Volume 43, No. 3, Classics and Contemporary Literature / Culture / Theory (2006), pp. 355–374 ( JSTOR 25659535 )
  • The Journey to the West , translated and commented by Eva Lüdi Kong, Reclam-Verlag Ditzingen 2016, ISBN 978-3-15-010879-6 .

Web links

Commons : Sun Wukong  - collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: x  - sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Die Reise in den Westen , translated and commented by Eva Lüdi Kong, Reclam-Verlag Ditzingen 2016, pp. 1289–1291.
  2. ^ Journey to the West - Character Profiles (Sun Wu Kong). Retrieved June 9, 2018 .