The Tang Priest does have a fatal weakness that many people know, and these weaknesses are also the defects of people in secular society. One of the most obvious shortcomings is cowardice. On the way to the west, whenever encountering steep mountains and rivers, monsters and ghosts, Tang Priest's face always turns pale and his fear is abnormal. In front of monsters, they often kneel down and loudly beg for mercy from the king. On the way to learn from the scriptures, Tang Priest often fails in everything. For example, when he asks to stay in a temple, he will be rebuffed, and even voluntarily go to Ramadan, and he will always jump into the trap of monsters. No wonder even Pig Bajie said, "Master is useless." His timidity has also evolved into shirking responsibility in the process of learning from the scriptures. For example, in the fifty-sixth time, bandits robbed the road and hanged the captured Tang Priest. After Wukong came to rescue him, he killed two thieves. The Tang Priest was unhappy. When he was buried and prayed, he said, "Go to the Rosen Hall to write poems, and fall down the tree to find the root. His surname is Sun and mine is Chen. They have different surnames. There is a head for grievances and a master for debts. Don't ask me to learn from a monk. " Afraid of implicating himself, he deliberately put all the responsibility on the Monkey King. He also has an obvious defect, that is, he is easy to listen to rumors and does not distinguish right from wrong. I'm afraid the most disgusting thing for readers is that he always recites spells to the Monkey King, and makes the Monkey King, a great disciple who faithfully protects him from going to the Western Heaven to learn Buddhist scriptures, toss and turn painfully. Especially in the period of "the Monkey King, the corpse demon, fought three times against Tang Sanzang, who was hunted by the holy monk", Mrs. Bones wanted to eat the flesh of Tang Priest, changed her mind three times and puzzled Tang Priest three times. For the first time, she became a beautiful daughter, for the second time, she became an old woman over eighty years old, and for the third time, she became an old man who lied to Tang Priest by "holding a few beads and reciting classics in the south". Tang Priest almost fell for it every time. Fortunately, he was caught by the Monkey King's critical eyes. However, the Tang Priest knows nothing. He even recited a spell to the Monkey King three times in a row, and finally wrote a derogatory book to drive the Monkey King away.
As a secular monk, Tang's monk still has his own unique image charm, although he has all kinds of personality defects of ordinary people. This charm is embodied in his pursuit of ideals and firm belief. There are four masters and apprentices, each of whom has his own unique pursuit, and not everyone takes learning as his goal. The Monkey King, his ideal is to sweep away all the demons in the world. He doesn't think about the significance and value of learning from the scriptures. His pleasure lies in the process of learning from the scriptures, and the difficulties and obstacles in this process have become the source of his realization of value. The Monkey King pursues lofty ideals. The pursuit of Zhu Bajie is materialistic, and Gao Laozhuang is a symbol, a symbol of family warmth and material richness. But Pig Bajie is not satisfied with the pure land like Gao Laozhuang, but "takes a bowl and looks at the pot". Food and color became his goal, and he was finally named "the messenger who cleaned the altar". Friar Sand's pursuit is even more pitiful. Its function is to ease the contradiction between master and apprentice and form the lubricant of interpersonal relationship. He is loyal to Master and has a double understanding and care for his brothers. Disciples often laugh at Master's pedantry, even angrily denounce Master's "compassion", and even there have been fierce conflicts between master and apprentice. However, contradiction is contradiction, and disciples still respect Master. The reason is that the ideals and beliefs of Tang Priests deeply influenced the three disciples, which became the core of the spiritual cohesion of the four disciples. Without the Tang Priest, this team would have been annihilated. The Monkey King returned to Huaguoshan, Pig Bajie returned to Gaolaozhuang and Friar Sand returned to Liushahe. They are still demons. In this sense, Tang Priest may be their spiritual savior.
The reason why Tang Priest has such a firm belief and such a lofty ideal comes from his painful experience of his family tragedy.