Legend of the The Monkey God
Most of the ninjas have different summons and Sandaime's summon is the Monkey. He summoned Enma, the Elder Monkey in his final battle against Orochimaru, Shodaime and Nidaime. Enma transformed himself into the Kongou Nyoi, the shape shifting diamond pole. The portrayal of Enma and Kongou Nyoi might be inspired from the Monkey God, Sun Wukong, from a famous Chinese mythology "Journey To The West".

Here's an introduction of Sun Wukong and we'll compare him to Enma.





The Monkey God from Journey to the West
Chinese legends has it that more than 500 years before the Tang Dynasty, a mischievous monkey was born from the rocks by the sea. This monkey made friends with a bunch of other monkeys and they lived behind a waterfall. One day, while the monkeys were monkeying around, one of the monkeys died and the monkey born of the rocks left the mountains to seek a way to immortality. He sought tutelege under a great taoist priest at a monastry who taught him the 72 arts of transformation. However, the monkey was mischievous and was soon chased out of the monastry for disobedience.


The monkey returned to his waterfall home, showed off his skills to his monkey friends and was crowned The Monkey King. One day, he paid a visit to the Dragon King, and stole the King's great treasure, the Golden Rod and wrecked the Dragon Palace.


When Yan Luowang, the God of Death tried to capture him in death, Sun Wukong wrecked havoc in Hell too and destroyed the Books of the Dead where the details of when which person dies is kept. The enraged Dragon King and Yan Luowang reported the atrocity of Sun Wukong to the Heavenly King and demanded the arrest of the Monkey King.

Thus, the Heavenly soldiers were sent to capture Sun Wukong but to no avail. A long battle ensued and when Sun Wukong was finally arrested and brought to the heavenly court, he tore the Heavenly Palace apart and declared himself Sage of the Heavens (or Monkey God). The Buddha then arrived, tricked and imprisoned the insolent Monkey God under the 5 Finger Mountain.


500 years later, the Tang Emperor sent his sworn brother, Tripitaka, a Buddhist monk to collect Buddhist scriptures from India and on his way, he encountered the Monkey God. He rescued the monkey by removing the seal on the mountain, named him Sun Wukong and Sun Wukong became the 1st of Tripitaka's 3 disciples to protect him from demons and spirits on his epic Journey to the West.

Sun Wukong and Enma
Their clothes: Enma wore tigerskin clothes like Sun Wukong. (Sun Wukong's tiger skin clothes were made by Tripitaka)

That Stick: The Golden Rod Sun Wukong stole from the Dragon King was a treasure because it could sort of shapeshift, changing to be as small as the size of a needle so the Monkey King could keep it in his ear or bigger than the Heavens so he could stir the oceans with it. It is indestructible and looks exactly like the shape shifting diamond pole Enma transformed into. Probably the pole was called diamond to describe it's indestructible attribute too.



Difference: The most distinct difference is probably their personalities. Sun Wukong is very mischievous and never stops moving even for a minute (more like Naruto) but Enma is wise and serious. Also, the Monkey God's Golden Rod doesn't talk.



Source: narutofever - under The Legend of the Monkey God