Life of Hyeonbu, Envoy of the Clear River (淸江使者玄夫傳)淸江使者玄夫傳
玄夫不知何許人也。或曰。其先神人也。兄弟十五人。皆體巨絶有力焉。天帝所命扶五山海中者是已。至子孫。形寢小。亦無以力聞者。唯以卜筮爲業。相地之利害。不常厥居。故其鄕里世系。不得詳焉。遠祖文甲。堯時隱居洛濱。帝聞其賢。聘以白璧。文甲負奇圖來獻。帝嘉之。因封洛水侯。曾祖自言上帝使者。不言其名。擔洪範九疇。授伯禹者是也。祖白若。夏后時鑄鼎於昆吾。與翁難乙致力有功。父重光。生而有文在左脅。曰月子重光。得我者。匹夫爲諸侯。諸侯爲帝王。因採其文名之。玄夫尤沈邃。其母夢。瑤光星入懷。因而有娠。始生。相者曰。背法盤丘。文成列宿。必神聖之相乎。及壯。覃研曆緯。凡天地日月陰陽寒暑風雨晦明災祥禍福之變。無不逆知。又學神仙行氣導引不死之方。性尙虎。常介而行。上聞其名。使使聘焉。玄夫傲然不顧。乃歌曰。泥塗之游。其樂無涯。巾笥之寵。寧吾所期。笑而不答。由是不能致。其後宋元王時。豫且強逼之。將致於王。未及謁。夢有人玄服輜車而來告曰。我淸江使者也。將見於王。明日。豫且果以玄夫來謁。王大悅。欲爵之。玄夫曰。臣爲豫且所強。且聞王有德。故來見耳。爵祿非本志。王豈欲留而不遣耶。王欲放遣。因衛平密諫乃止。卽調爲水衡丞。又遷授都水使者。俄擢爲大史令。凡國之施爲注措動作興亡。事無大小。莫不咨而後行。上嘗戲曰。子神明之後。且明吉凶。不早自圖。落豫且之謀。爲寡人所獲。何也。玄夫曰。明有所不見。智有所不及故爾。王笑之。其後莫知所終。至今搢紳間。有慕其德。用黃金鑄像而佩之者。胄子曰。元緖爲人所烹。臨死歎曰。行不擇日。今而見烹。雖然。盡南山之樵。不能潰我。其慷慨如此。次子曰元宁。浪遊吳越間。自號洞玄先生。次子。史失其名。形極小不能卜。唯升木捕蟬。亦爲人所烹。其族屬或有得道。至千歲不死。所在有靑雲覆之者。或隱於吏。世號玄衣督郵云。
Of Hyeonbu (玄夫) it is not known what manner of man he was. Some say: "His ancestor was a divine man. The fifteen brothers were all great of body and outstanding in strength. They are the ones whom the Emperor of Heaven commanded to bear up the five mountains in the midst of the sea." By the time of his descendants their forms had grown gradually smaller, and there was none among them renowned for strength either, so that divination alone was their calling. They examined the profit and harm of each place and were forever shifting where they lived, and so their native village and their line of descent (世系) cannot be known in detail.
His distant ancestor Mungap (文甲) lived hidden by the River Luo in the time of Emperor Yao. The emperor heard of his worth and summoned him with a white jade, and Mungap came bearing a marvelous chart on his back and presented it. The emperor thought it fine and enfeoffed him as Marquis of the River Luo (洛水侯). His great-grandfather called himself the envoy of the Lord on High and would not tell his name; he is the one who came bearing the Nine Categories of the Great Plan (洪範九疇) on his back and gave them to Bo Yu (伯禹). His grandfather Baegyak (白若), in the time of the Xiahou clan, put out his whole strength along with Ongnaneul (翁難乙) at the casting of the cauldrons at Kunwu (昆吾), and had merit in it. His father Junggwang (重光) was born with writing on his left flank which said, "Child of the moon, Junggwang; whoever gets me, if he be a common man shall become a feudal lord, and if he be a feudal lord shall become an emperor." It was from that writing that his name was made.
Hyeonbu was deeper and more hidden still. His mother conceived after seeing in a dream the Jasper-Light Star (瑤光星) enter her bosom. When he was first born a reader of faces said, "His back is modeled on Bangu (盤丘) and his markings form the constellations; this must surely be the aspect of a holy sage." When he grew up he studied deeply the calendrical arts and the weft-texts (緯書), and there was nothing he did not know beforehand of the changes of heaven and earth, sun and moon, yin and yang, cold and heat, wind and rain, dark and light, disaster and good omen, calamity and blessing. He also ordered the breath of the immortals and learned the method of not dying by the guiding and drawing of breath (導引). His nature set store by caution, and he always went about wrapped in his shell.
The king heard his name and sent an envoy to summon him. Hyeonbu was haughty and would not so much as look round, but sang thus: "To roam in the mud — there is no end to the joy of it. As for the favor of being set in a kerchief box, how should that be what I wish for?" He only laughed and did not answer. For this reason he could not be called.
Afterward, in the time of King Yuan of Song, Yuqie (豫且) seized him by force and would have sent him to the king. Before he had yet been presented, a certain person came in the king's dream, dressed in black and riding in a baggage cart, and declared: "I am the envoy of the Clear River. I am about to present myself to the king." The next day Yuqie did indeed bring Hyeonbu and present him, and the king was greatly delighted and would have given him office. Hyeonbu said: "Your servant was forced by Yuqie, and he had also heard that the king had virtue, and so he has come to present himself, and no more. Office and salary were never his intent. Why should the king wish to hold him and not send him away?" The king would have let him go, but Wei Ping (衛平) privately remonstrated and he gave it up. He appointed him at once Assistant of Waterways (水衡丞), then moved him to be Commissioner of the Metropolitan Waters (都水使者), and presently singled him out as Director of the Grand Astrologer's Office (大史令). In all the state's measures and arrangements, its movements and its rise and fall, there was nothing, great matter or small, that was not done only after he had been asked.
The king once teased him, saying: "You are the descendant of the divine and the bright, and you are clear besides about the lucky and the unlucky; how then is it that you could not plan for yourself in time, but fell into Yuqie's scheme and were caught by us?" Hyeonbu said: "It is because there is something that even clear sight does not see, and something that even wisdom does not reach." The king laughed. Where he ended afterward is not known. Even now there are those among the officials who, longing after his virtue, cast his likeness in gold and wear it about with them.
His eldest son was called Wonseo (元緖), and when he was boiled to death by another he sighed and said: "I did not choose my days for going about, and now I am boiled. Yet though they burn up all the trees of the southern hills, they will not make me crumble." Such was the high spirit of him. His next son was called Wonjeo (元宁), who drifted about between Wu and Yue and called himself Master of Penetrating Mystery (洞玄先生). The name of the next son has dropped out of the histories; his form was exceedingly small so that he could not divine, and he only climbed trees to catch cicadas, and was likewise boiled by another. Among his kin there are said to be some who have attained the Way and have not died down to a thousand years, and a blue cloud covers the place where they are; and some, it is said, hide in the work of petty clerks, and the world calls them the Dark-Robed Postal Inspector (玄衣督郵).
Interlinear notes 1
玄中記曰。鼇。巨龜也。
The Record of the Midst of Mystery (玄中記) says, "The o (鼇) is a great turtle."
2Words of the Historian
史臣曰。察至微防未兆。聖人容或有差。以玄夫之智。不能杜豫且之謀。又不救二子之烹。況其餘哉。昔仲尼厄於匡。又使門人子路未免於醢。嗚呼。可不愼乎。
The historian says: in examining what is utterly hidden and in guarding against what shows no sign, even a sage may sometimes go wrong. With all Hyeonbu's wisdom he could not guard against Yuqie's scheme, nor could he save his two sons from being boiled — how much less the rest of us? Long ago Zhongni (仲尼) too was put to shame in the land of Kuang (匡), and could not keep his disciple Zilu (子路) from being minced into pickle. Ah, can one not be careful?