The three tests across chapters

Introduction

This is a review week. We read three chapters together: Against Fate I, where the three tests are stated; Explaining Accountability, where they are applied to spirits; and Will of Heaven II, where 天志 is set up as the standard. All year we have tested dozens of chapters by the three tests. Now we turn them on Mozi.

First, the text of Against Fate I. "Every statement must have three tests. What are they? Mozi said: grounding, checking, and use. Ground it in what? Above, in the deeds of the ancient sage kings. Check it against what? Below, against the evidence of the people's eyes and ears. Use it how? Put it into law and policy and see whether it benefits the state and the people." Precedent, evidence, consequences. Mozi uses them to reject fate: the sage kings' books do not mention it, nobody has ever seen it, and believing in it stops people trying. Here the tests are used cleanly.

Now Explaining Accountability. To prove spirits exist, Mozi uses the tests again. Second test: "from antiquity to the present, since people first existed, there have been those who saw the forms of spirits and heard their voices." He tells how Du Bo's ghost shot King Xuan of Zhou, "seen by all who were there, heard by all who were far." First test: the sage kings' books record spirits and the sage kings sacrificed to them. Third test: "if everyone in the world believed that spirits reward the worthy and punish the violent, how could the world be in disorder?"

That is this week's topic. At the third test you will notice Mozi's weight shifting. He no longer argues that spirits exist; he argues that believing in them is useful. "Useful" and "true" are different, and Mozi himself uses exactly that difference to reject fate. And the "eyes and ears of the many" that in Defense Against Tunnels meant repeatable observation here means unrepeatable report.

Finally Will of Heaven II: "I have the will of heaven as a wheelwright has his compass and a carpenter his square." 天志 is the compass and square for measuring everything; "heaven's intent is that large states not attack small ones." 墨门 / The Mohist Community reads 天志 as "an objective standard above rulers." Ask this week whether that reading passes the three tests.

The three tests

Against Fate I uses all three tests and each holds. Explaining Accountability uses all three, but the second rests on hearsay and the third proves "believing is useful," not "it is true." Measured by Mozi's own ruler, at least two of its tests are weak. Will of Heaven II leans almost entirely on the third test: 天志 is the standard because acting by it "promotes the world's benefit." This is the most honest point in Mozi's system: even his highest standard must in the end be proven by consequences. The Community holds that this is not a weakness but the real meaning of the three tests: nothing is exempt from testing, including the standard itself.

For families

• Three-tests scoring game: take three household rules (no phones at dinner, brush teeth before bed, Saturday clean-up), score each on the three tests, and compare.
• Tell the story of Du Bo, then ask: what is the difference between "many people say they saw it" and "you saw it yourself"?
• "Compass and square": give a child a ruler and have them find things at home that are not straight. Then ask what the ruler for "right or wrong" is.

For chapters

• 20 min reading · 20 min 墨辩 · 10 min 三表 review · 10 min 职 reports.
• 墨辩 motion: "Explaining Accountability fails Mozi's own three tests." One side goes test by test; the other defends Mozi and may cite the Diebi passage in Gongmeng to show the limits he set himself.
• Extend the 三表 review to the whole year: from week 1 to week 48, which discussion actually changed a chapter decision through the three tests? Write it down for the year-end self-review and the 兼爱大会 report.