The Chinese novel "Journey to the West", attributed to Wu Chengen (c.1500-82), opens with the birth from a stone egg of Monkey, Sun Wukong, who progresses from becoming the King of the Monkeys on the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit, to achieving supernatural Daoist skills. Bounding through the skies on clouds, he creates havoc on his visits to heaven in the vain hope of achieving ever higher celestial office. Having eaten the peaches of immortality specially grown for the banquet to be held by the Heavenly Queen Mother of the West, and upset the Jade Emperor and other deities, he is finally incarcerated beneath the Mountain of the Five Elements by the Buddha. Released to accompany the monk Xuan Zhang on his quest to obtain the holy Buddhist scriptures from India (the Sutra), these two, and three other pilgrims - Pigsy, Monk Sha and the dragon horse - overcome 81 calamities and confrontations in the form of supernatural phenomena and monsters before reaching their goal and returning to China with the texts.
The story is loosely based on an actual journey undertaken by the monk Xuan Zhang in the 7th century across the desert wastes of Chinese Central Asia to India (equated with Paradise in the novel), the home of Buddhism, to collect Buddhist texts for translation into Chinese. (Source: British Library - Mythical Quest)
Here is one for Canada issued in 2004 to celebrate the Chinese Year of the Monkey. It shows Sun Wukong, the Monkey King and Xuan Zhang and his companions in their journey to India to bring the Sutra:
Fortunately, Canada issued more stamps and SS's with the image of the Monkey King. I will show them with time.
Monkey Volume 6 "Evil must have good to feed upon." "A good man may suffer until his goodness flows. The cause of all suffering is desire, and even to desire not to desire is still to be caught on the wheel."
During the war, Sun Wukong, the Monkey King hijacked the secret weapon of the Sky Army - an iron rod with the ability to lengthen or shrink at the command of its owner. This weapon served the monkey in his future battles. With this weapon, the monkey came down to the underworld, threatened the king and asked to transform him and his companion immortal creatures.
Here are several items show Sun Wukong, the Monkey King, with his secret weapon:
The first Chinese animated full length feature film "Uproar in Heaven" was created in 1964. The film tells the novel "Journey to the West – Adventures of Monkey King" by Wu Chengen.
To commemorate the 50th anniversary to the film creation, the PR of China issued in 2014 a set of six stamps showing different scenes from the film:
Sun Wukong, the Monkey King, during his first visit to Jerusalem, Israel:
The Republic of China (Taiwan) issued four sets of stamps depicting scenes from the novel "Journey to the West - the Adventures of Monkey King". Here is the the first of them, issued on September 24, 1997:
Sun Wukong, the Monkey King, with his weapon:
Xuan Zhang, the monk and his companions in their journey to India to bring the Sutra:
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Posted 07/08/2020 11:55 am
