Production Notes - Episode 6 | Guan Yin/Mu Cha/Er Lang Shen

Journey to the West, an audio drama series Production notes Episode 6. The 5th Monkey is a teammate of volunteers from around the world. We do not receive any outside funding. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to keep the series going. Thank you. Hello dear listeners. This is Lynn, the voice of the 5th Monkey. How are our subscribers doing?

Thank you very much for supporting the project and we hope you all stick around until the very end, subscriber or not. And thank you to everyone who gave us five star ratings on Spotify. It's funny because somehow we just found out this is the thing and we are very surprised that this many of you actually bothered to rate us.

Love Received. We also open up the comment and post sections of the podcast, so feel free to interact with the team whenever you want. So how did you guys enjoy Chapter 6? The translator had a blast working on this chapter because it features so many new gods that we absolutely adore, and these gods will be the focus of this episode of Production Notes.

Let's talk about them in the order of appearance. First of all, Juan Yin Bodisattva. So in Sanskrit she goes by both Avlok Deshwala and Avlok Desfada. If you're already confused, just head to our YouTube channel for subtitles. So initially the latter name Avlok Desfada was thought to be a misreading, but it turned out that both names are correct, only used by people of different eras or regions.

The name we used in chapter 6 is Avlok Deshwala. Meaning the Lord who looks down upon all this name is translated into Guang zhai in Chinese by none other than the monk Shenzheng himself. Alternatively, Avlok Desfala, meaning the observer of all the sounds, is translated into Guangxuyin in Chinese by monks preceding Shenzheng.

This name entered the Chinese language earlier in time and remains the more popular usage today. Any Chinese person would know who Guanying Pusa is, and probably has a portrait or statue of hers somewhere in their homes. Now, as with every other mythical being we have covered so far in the series, guanying has no definite origin and her image has been evolving nonstop ever since entering Chinese culture.

She has many different forms in folklore, some of which will also appear in Journey to the West, but we will leave it at that for the time being. More often than not, Guanyin is depicted as a goddess, but that's not a definite thing. Male form Guanyin does exist, but take note that in Journey to the West, Guanyin is categorically presented as a female deity. She can transform into men when needed to, but when she returns to what we call the true form.

She is a woman. However, if you look at other bodies Atwa who appeared later in the story, the distinctions aren't always as clear. Some of these gods, if you trace their Buddhist or Hinduism origins, are canonly gender ambiguous, and that includes Guanine herself. So even when people vaguely assigned them with specific genders, mostly male, they still appear in folk art with some feminine features. So that is the thing.

But I do want to caution against equating the gender ambiguity in the heavily religious context to the gender nonconformity we understand in the modern age. That is to say, just because some gods are canonly gender ambiguous does not necessarily mean the people who worship them Take that as a validation for something that could be seen in real people.

In other words, gods can transform and be whatever they want specifically because they are powerful gods and above humans. And people are very OK with that. But that doesn't necessarily mean they also think it is noble for themselves or others to be seen that way. Look at the real people on the ground. Study the events and changes of that specific era. Understand their perspective and priorities. Just don't jump to conclusions.

Especially do not jump to conclusions that are simplified into modern age. Western vocabularies use words and language from the culture of origin. And often you will get a more accurate picture that is different from when you look at it solely from your own point of view. Context and nuance are so important in this regard, and I hope our listeners never lose sight of that when discussing these topics.

Next up, Mucha Guanying's disciple. He, like any other folk deity out there, is a mixture of different figures. You can also call him Muja, by the way. It's an alternative name that gives out more brotherly vibes with Nuerja in the you and general translations. He is called Moksh. What you need to know is that Moksh Hui, an and second son of Heavenly King Lee are three separate concepts and identities that morphed into one figure. Recall the 4th episode of Production Notes when we covered Heavenly King Lee and Nuerja.

In the early days he just had one son, and then somehow he had two more. Moocha was one of those extra sons that folklore gave the family. So was his status as Guanyan's senior disciple. I think for readers of Journey to the West, there is nothing wrong with sticking to what the novel presents you, because that is also widely known and understood by the general public. You just have to remember that this wasn't a set thing from day one.

It's a very organic and fluid process and honestly, I think our listeners should be super used to it by now, which is why we move on to our new heartthrob, our lung Shun. Our lung literally means second son. But do you see any of these biological siblings out there? Nope. Why is that? Because once again, he was originally half a dozen different people and some of them happen to be Second Sons.

The folklore took the Arlan part of the name, but discarded the actual family members required for him to have this name in the 1st place. We could go on forever if we dig deeper into his origins and extended stories, but we won't do that and instead just stick to what Journey to the West decided to make of him. In the novel we know his family name is young and he owns a dog. In folklore, he is also commonly depicted with a third eye in the middle of his forehead.

That isn't specified in chapter six though, which only had mentions of Phoenix Eye or Phoenix Eyes, which we translated into Divine Eyes. The Chinese language can be super vague, but no specific mention is not equal to denial of existence, so we actually encourage you to imagine him using his third eye whenever we mention Divine Eyes.

Because even though the origins and folklore of our luncheon may be a mess to navigate through, the image of the deity himself does carry some consistent elements. The Third eye, the loyal skinny hound that's always by his side, and his spear are all his signature features. In chapter six, he was also described as having long ear lobes down to his shoulders. This might strike you as odd.

Until you Google Buddhist sculpture, notice how they all have unusually long earlobes. That's a feature indicating divinity and power, and can be applied to non Buddhist figures as well. You don't have to force yourself to imagine him that way, but just know why this description is there. Just a very personal note here.

Don't you just love that whenever Arnanshan makes a grand statement, his sworn brothers were like we don't have time for that. I don't know why that's so funny to me. Moving on. And our translator really wants me to highlight this because it's not every day where she can find such a clear cut mistake in the English translations and correct them in the audio drama.

So remember how there are all these smaller gods who fight under our LAN Shen? They are called Tao Tao Shen in Chinese. Tao means grass weed and toe means head. Shen just means God. In EU version they are translated as plant headed deities and in the gender version they became straw headed gods. And we want you to know that both are incorrect because this word was never meant to be translated literally character by character.

Sao can also mean rough draft and unofficial. We have a term in Chinese called Sao Tai Banzu, literally roughly staged theater troupes. Who would perform in the countryside and were generally considered amateurish, so the name extended its usage to refer to any temporary and barely put together team that isn't expected to accomplish much.

And going back to the name Tao Toshan, which instead of referring to plants, it's actually using the same meaning used in Tao Tai Banzu. So these gods aren't called Tao Toe because they are plant based. At no point in the novel this was ever implied to be the case. Instead they are Toto because they are low level deities who never received official appointments from Heaven.

That is actually something mentioned in the novel because Arlantian specifically reminded his brothers that it cannot go up to Heaven with him due to their unappointed status. That is why our translation for Toto Shen is unappointed deities. The final group of gods we want to talk about in this episode will be Arshabasin, Xio, or sometimes just Arshabasio, the 28 constellations.

No one on the team has any expertise on astrology, so we actually won't be going too deep in this regard. But we will say that the 28 constellations aren't simply the Chinese version of horoscopes. Far from it, because when Asian Chinese observe the skies and assign meaning to the stars. They weren't thinking in the visual sense, so they weren't exactly thinking. If we connect these stars, they will look like this thing or creature.

That was not their priority. What they were thinking instead was projecting real world concepts onto the skies. Basically everything they could see and use and experience in the real world. Different rooms in the house, city, gates, walls, etc. They found a constellation in the sky to host that concept. Which is why the name Arshabasio can also be translated into 28 mansions.

And that principle is applicable to other constellations too, not just the 28 we're talking about here, but we will focus on this team of 28 for the time being. For clarity, we will use Mao Ruzi as an example to explain how they're named. Mao refers to decorative animal hair. Usually cows that are found on flags Xu means sun and XI means chicken. The first character is the concept this mentioned hosts. The second character would be one of the seven luminaries. We talked about 9 luminaries in the last episode, right? But remember how two of them aren't real celestial bodies? They are not included in the seven luminaries. The seven luminaries are Sun, Moon, Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, Mars, and Saturn.

And because Chinese people name the planets with the five faces, the seven luminaries are now Sun, Moon, Ghost * Wood Star, Water Star, Fire Star, and Earth Star. There are 28 constellations, so they're assigned to the seven luminaries in groups of four. The four constellations we met in Chapter 6 all come from the group of Rue, meaning Sun.

And the final character in the name is just the name of an animal. Most of them are real life animals, but a few are mythical. On top of that, Maorizi is specified later in Journey to the West as a male deity and after some rendering, Maorizi became sun rooster of plumes. These 28 gods aren't as difficult to get to know once you learn the meaning of their names and the patterns behind the naming process. I personally just love all the animal Goths in the story because they're always so much fun to have around. Lastly, just one very small thing. What do we mean by have eyes but no pupils? It insults someone for being able to see but not understand or comprehend.

Very often it is thrown around when the user feels insulted or underappreciated. If you think you're super famous but someone has no idea who you are. And they have eyes, but no pupils. Okay. That's another episode of Production Notes for you here. This episode is sponsored by Patreons, Zachary J Claire, Tony Lin, Damien and also our dear subscribers on podcast. Thank you all so very much.

Before you leave, don't forget to follow us and subscribe. This is the fifth monkey and thank you for listening. Journey to the West, an audio drama series, is a production by the 5th Monkey. If you enjoy our work, become our pay subscriber or patron to gain access to the latest release and other exclusive content.

Head to www.thefithmonkey.com for links to all the platforms we are on and support us on social media. Shares, comments, emails. All are welcome. This is Lynn. See you in the next episode.

Production Notes - Episode 6 | Guan Yin/Mu Cha/Er Lang Shen

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