Follow us on Facebook to receive important updates Follow us on Twitter to receive important updates Follow us on sina.com's microblogging site to receive important updates Follow us on Douban to receive important updates
Chinese Text Project
Simplified Chinese version
Back Forward
Mohism -> Mozi -> Book 8 -> On Ghosts III -> 15

If there are testimonies of ghosts only in the books of Shang and none in those of Xia it is still not reliable.
But we have "Speech at Gan" among the books of Xia running thus:
"In the midst of the war at Gan
the Emperor called the six associates
to receive instructions in the headquarters.
He said:
'The Prince of Hu violated the five elements
and disused the three calendars.
。” Heaven decreed to exterminate his life!'
And he continued :
'At noon
I shall grapple with the Prince of Hu for the fate of the day.
But (mind you), you ministers and people,
it is not because I covet their lind and treasures.
I am only carrying out the punishment in obedience to Heaven.
If you on the left do not do your part on the left you will be disobeying my orders; if you on the right do not do your part on the right you will be disobeying my orders;
”’。 if you charioteers do not manage your horses according to orders you will be disobeying my orders.
And rewards will be distributed before my ancestors and punishments will be meted out before the altar.
" Why were rewards distributed before the ancestors?
To submit their fairness.
Why were punishments meted out before the altar?
To submit their justice.
Because the ancient sage-kings must reward virtue and punish vice with ghosts and spirits, they distributed rewards before the ancestors and meted out punishments before the altar.
And here we have a testimony of ghosts in the books of Xia.
Now, first in the books of Xia
and next in the books of Shang and Zhou,
testimonies to the existence of ghosts and spirits occur
again and again.
What is the reason for this?
Because the sage-kings were interested in it.
Judging from the records of these books, how can we doubt that there are ghosts and spirits?
Anciently,
on the propitious day of ding mao,
Zhou offered thanksgiving to Earth and the Four Quarters,
1
and their ancestors.
寿’。 They did this to prolong their age.
寿If there were no ghosts and spirits, how could their age be prolonged?

1. 者 : Inserted. 孙诒让《墨子闲诂》


Enjoy this site? Please help.Site design and content copyright 2006-2024. When quoting or citing information from this site, please link to the corresponding page or to https://ctext.org/ens. Please note that the use of automatic download software on this site is strictly prohibited, and that users of such software are automatically banned without warning to save bandwidth. 沪ICP备09015720号-3Comments? Suggestions? Please raise them here.