Taoist secular gods. Legend has it that after the Song Dynasty, many Erlang temples were built in various places. Its origin is as follows:
●The second son of Li Bing, the prefect of Shu County in the Qin Dynasty, helped his father kill the dragon and build weirs to quell the trouble. The people of Shu worshiped him as the god Guankou Erlang and worshiped him endlessly in the temple. Also known as Jiro Guanguchi.
●In the Sui Dynasty, Zhao Yu, the prefect of Jiazhou, killed the dragons and quelled the floods. Later, he appeared to quell the floods. The people felt his virtues, built a temple to drink water, and worshiped him as Erlang God. Also known as Jiro Guanguchi.
●In "Journey to the West" and "The Romance of the Gods", it is recorded that Yang Jian, the nephew of the Jade Emperor, had great supernatural powers. He once killed six monsters and split Taoshan. He was named Guankou Erlang.
●Deng Xia of the Jin Dynasty was the prefect of Xiangyang. He cut off the water dragons to get rid of the trouble. The villagers built temples to worship him. Because he was once Erlang General, he was later revered as Erlang God.
●According to legend, Dujian, the second son of the Northern Duowen Heavenly King Bishamon among the four heavenly kings, once led the heavenly troops to save Emperor Ming of the Tang Dynasty in danger. He is one of the Buddhist protectors. King Bishamon had five sons (one theory is that each of the four heavenly kings had ninety-one sons). Zhang Zhengxang quoted Fu Kong's "Bishamon Ritual". It is recorded that Du Jian led the heavenly troops to rescue Anxi, pointing out that Erlang Shen was this Du Jian, and believed that this could explain why Erlang Shen had a close relationship with Nezha in the early dramas, because Nezha was the third son of Bishamon, the king of Duowen, and Du Jian It's a brotherly relationship. He also specifically talked about the connection between the golden rat in Du Jian's hand and Erlang Shen's slender-waisted dog.
(1) Yang Jian, like Sun Wukong, can also undergo seventy-two changes. Chapter 2 of "Journey to the West" narrates that Sun Wukong was willing to "learn a transformation of the earth demon", so "one skill can be understood and all the skills can be understood. At that time, he learned the formula, practiced on his own, and learned all seventy-two transformations." Chapter 40 of "The Romance of the Gods" introduces Yang Jianshi and says that he "has practiced Nine Transformations, seventy-two transformations, infinite wonderful way", teasing Zhang Kui (Chapter 86) is the best of his "infinite wonderful way" Note that the novel also specifically mentions that he has transformed into a fox-sable (Chapter 40), a stone (Chapter 54), a five-color rooster and a centipede (Chapter 91), and a white-fronted tiger (Chapter 92). How many transformations Yang Jian had, the various legends of Erlang God actually do not clearly specify a number. Generally speaking, they only generally say that he has great magical powers, and he once transformed an ox into a dragon to fight a dragon and conquered the Bull Demon King. Upon further investigation, "The Romance of the Gods" states with great confidence that Yang Jian will undergo "seventy-two changes", probably due to the hints of stories such as "Erlang Shen locks the Great Sage Qitian" and "The Little Sage exerts his power to subjugate the Great Sage", thinking that Erlang Shen will Since Sun Wukong can be subdued, at least his transformation index cannot be less than Sun Wukong.
(2) Related to the above details, Yang Jian can often get into the belly of his opponent and force the opponent to submit. This is surprisingly consistent with Sun Wukong who often "turns somersaults and stands like a dragonfly" in the monster's belly. At this point, Sun Wukong at least caused the black bear spirit, the iron fan princess, the yellow eyebrow king and the green lion spirit to suffer greatly (see chapters 17, 59, 66, and 75 respectively). There are three such descriptions in "The Romance of the Gods": The first time is when Yang Jian got into the belly of the fox and marten as soon as he appeared on the stage, "Pinched the heart of the fox and marten, and the thing screamed and fell down, Yang Jian "Appeared and pushed the fox and marten into two parts", greatly defeating the enemy's energy (Chapter 40); the second time was after being eaten by Ma Yuan, "Yang Jian used eighty-nine yuan skills to change and move wonderfully. A strange pill caused Ma Yuan to have diarrhea for three days, and Ma Yuan lost half of his weight" (Chapter 60); the last time was when Yang Jian "took his hand on his heart and liver" in Zhu Zizhen's abdomen, forcing Zhu Zizhen to Revealing his true form, he knelt down at the Zhou camp (Chapter 92). Defeating the enemy by making trouble in the enemy's belly is not Sun Wukong's patented ability (Hua Guang in "Journey to the South" also has this ability), but it is something that many Erlang Gods except Yang Jian do not have, so It is not unreasonable to think that Yang Jian's specialty was inherited from Sun Wukong.
(3) In "Journey to the West", when Sun Wukong is defeated by a monster, he will always find ways to find out the monster's identity, and then go to rescue troops. This is almost a narrative routine in "Journey to the West". Similarly, Yang Jian in "The Romance of the Gods" also played such a role. When encountering an extremely difficult enemy, Yang Jian had the responsibility to find out the identity of the enemy and then invite immortals or borrow treasures to defeat the enemy.
For example, Yang Jian once went to Jialong Mountain to investigate the origin of Tu Xingsun and the whereabouts of the rope that bound the immortal. He asked Tu Xingsun's master to keep Sun down from the mountain (Chapter 55); he borrowed a lamp to reveal Ma Shan's true form, and then moved it to the Jialong Mountain. Ran Deng subdued him (Chapter 63-64); learned from Master Yuding how to detoxify the blood knife, and then easily killed Yu Hua (Chapter 75); and learned from Master Yuding about Gao Ming, Gao Jue's background is revealed, so he can destroy his lair and break his magic (Chapter 90). Chapters 58 and 81 recount that Yang Jian asked Fuxi and Shennong for herbs that could cure plague and poisonous pox, which can also be included in this category.
(4) Yang Jian has changed his true form several times to steal treasures. For example, after Yang Jian killed Mo Lishou’s flower fox mink, he transformed into a flower fox mink with the intention of stealing four treasures from the four generals of the Mo family. After alerting the opponent, only one item was stolen (Chapter 40). Another example is that in order to defeat the Blood Sword, Yang Jian transformed into Yu Hua and went to Penglai Mountain to defraud the elixir of Yu Yuan from Qi Immortal (Chapter 75). This is easily reminiscent of the famous plots of Sun Wukong "Teng Na cheating on the treasure" and "Two-tone banana fan" (chapters 34 and 60).
(5) Sun Wukong used Samadhi fire to forge the flat peaches, royal wine and elixir he had eaten into a piece, and developed the body of King Kong. "His body" (Chapter 7), this is something Sun Wukong himself is quite proud of. It clearly describes that the plot of Sun Wukong's hard head is that six thieves "dance with guns and swords" and "cut seventy or eighty times" on Sun Wukong's head. "Just pretend you don't know" (Chapter 14). Little did they know that Yang Jian also had such magical powers. Chapter 42 of "The Romance of the Gods" recounted that Wen Zhong used the double whip of yin and yang to beat Jiang Ziya, Nezha, Jin Zha, Mu Zha and Han Dulong in the first battle of Xiqi, but when Yang Jian faced him, At that time, Wen Zhong "raised his two whips and hit Yang Jian on the top of the door, only to make sparks burst out. He ignored him completely, just like normal", which made Wen Zhong have to admire Yang Jian as a "moral man".
(6) "The Romance of the Gods" tells that Tu Xingsun sneaked into the Zhou camp to assassinate King Wu. He saw a concubine sleeping on the bed. Yang Jian changed, so Yang Jian "wrapped Tu Xingsun in a bundle with both hands", "Tu Xingsun was naked and could not stretch out" (Chapter 54). The plot of Yang Jianzhi capturing Tu Xingsun is somewhat similar to Sun Wukong teasing Zhu Bajie in Gaojiazhuang.
The above are the similarities between Yang Jian and Sun Wukong. Since "Journey to the West" and "The Romance of the Gods" were written first and which is still controversial, the author does not want to simply conclude that Yang Jian's image copied Sun Wukong. Certain elements of the image, although this is more likely than its opposite. However, it is necessary to emphasize that these similarities between the two sides are not reflected in Erlang Shen except Yang Jian. This at least shows that the shaping of Yang Jian's image not only comes from Erlang Shen, but also has a certain connection with Sun Wukong. Of course, the reason why Sun Wukong is one of the origins of Yang Jian's image is mostly due to Yang Jian's identity as Erlang God, because the evolution histories of Erlang God and Sun Wukong's respective images have always been overlapping and entangled.
It is not the task of this article to describe the evolution history of the respective images of both parties in detail. We only need to point out two basic facts here: Erlang Shen and Sun Wukong were both inspired by the legend of the water god (Wuzhiqi and Sizhou The influence of the Great Sage), whose predecessors were all water gods, is one; Erlang Shen and Sun Wukong are closely related to the legend of the dragon. They are both the incarnation of the dragon and experts in subduing the dragon. This can explain the complex relationship between Erlang Shen and Sun Wukong in the long-term evolution process, which is sometimes hostile and sometimes cooperative, similar to enemies: on the one hand, because their predecessors were both water gods and experts in subduing dragons, the two sides can cooperate or even replace each other. For example, Erlang Shen once helped Sun Wukong subdue Zhu Bajie (see the "Journey to the West" drama, and the "Journey to the West" novel has Sun Wukong replacing the role of Erlang Shen). The two also worked together to sweep the Wansheng Dragon Palace and injure the nine-headed insect monster (see "Journey to the West" "Novel"); Erlang Shen once worked with Nezha to defeat the Bull Demon King ("Erlang Shen Shoots the Magic Mirror"), and Sun Wukong also defeated the Bull Demon King with Nezha ("Journey to the West" novel). In short, the cooperation and substitution relationship between the two parties is quite Obvious.
On the other hand, because both parties are both incarnations of dragons and experts in subduing dragons, and these two identities happen to be in a hostile relationship, so when one of the two parties is the incarnation of a dragon and the other is an expert in subduing dragons, they are in a hostile relationship. Zaju There is a title in "Erlang Shen Locks the Great Sage Qi Tian", the novel "Journey to the West" has the plot of "the little sage exerts his power to subjugate the great sage", and "Qingyuan Miaodao Reveals the Holy Lord Erlang Baojuan" even says that Erlang Shen was angry with the traveler. He pinned his mother at the foot of Mount Tai before "casting a heavenly and earthly net to catch the traveler and crush him into the mountain."