Reconstructing Mozi's Jian'ai

Youngsun Back

Philosophy East and West, Volume 67, Number 4, October 2017, pp. 1092-1117
(Article)

Published by University of Hawai'i Press

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/pew.2017.0095

For additional information about this article

https://muse.jhu.edu/article/673997

Access provided by University of Utah (25 Dec 2018 16:55 GMT)

 RECONSTRUCTING MOZI’S JIAN’AI 兼 愛

Youngsun Back
College of Confucian Studies and Eastern Philosophy, Sungkyunkwan University
ysback@skku.edu

I. Introduction

One of the core doctrines of Mozi 墨子 is his teaching on jian’ai 兼愛, and this is
discussed primarily in the three chapters bearing this term in their title.1 The term
“jian’ai” and its theme also appear scattered throughout the Mozi, such as in chap-
ters like “Standards and Rules” and the “Intention of Tian.” Jian’ai has been translated
into English as “Universal Love,” “Inclusive Care,” “Impartial Care,” and other simi-
lar phrases. As these various translations suggest, there is not yet a prevailing consen-
sus on the exact meaning of jian’ai.2
Despite his renowned clarity and simplicity and his skill at argumentation, those
who try to pin down Mozi’s teaching on jian’ai soon encounter difficulties. I think
there are two major reasons for this: one is that at times Mozi argued in an unsatis-
factory way, and another is the strong influence of Mengzi’s 孟子 criticisms of Mozi.
To begin with, Mozi’s seemingly obvious doctrine of jian’ai is in fact not so coherent
and systematic, for several reasons that involve questions about the audience, char-
acteristics of content, and the doctrine’s evolving nature. First, as many scholars ac-
knowledge, the main target of Mozi’s teaching is the rulers of his day or those with
aspirations to rule the world. Nevertheless, many parts of his teachings seem to ap-
peal to people more generally. This might be one of the reasons that Franklin Perkins
describes Mozi as teaching “public doctrines.”3 Second, Mozi’s fundamental ideas
and his rhetoric were so tightly intertwined that it is hard to discern to what extent his
words engage in persuading his audience to practice jian’ai and to what extent his
words reflect his theoretical claims about jian’ai. Third, recent scholarship suggests
that the three chapters of “Jian’ai” (Impartial Care) in particular and the Mozi text in
general may have evolved over time.4 This implies that there might be some changes
or even inconsistencies within the teachings of Mozi.
In addition to these difficulties, another obstacle to deciphering Mozi’s jian’ai
is Mengzi’s criticisms of Mozi.5 Mengzi famously attacked Mozi’s jian’ai as “love
without distinctions,” as opposed to the Ruist ren 仁 as “love with distinctions” or
“graded love.”6 This contrast between the two doctrines has been tremendously
­influential in the subsequent analysis and interpretation of jian’ai, even up to the
present day: for example, David Wong aligns Mozi’s jian’ai with “universal obliga-
tions” versus the Ruist ren with “particularistic obligations.”7 In other words, the
study of Mozi’s jian’ai has been largely framed by this Mo-Meng opposition. How­
ever, this is Mengzi’s interpretation of Mozi after all, and his simple appraisal of
Mozi’s jian’ai as “love without distinctions” prevents us from savoring the complex-

1092 Philosophy East & West  Volume 67, Number 4 October 2017 1092–1117
© 2017 by University of Hawai‘i Press
ity of Mozi’s teaching.8 In order to understand Mozi properly, I think we should
­remove Mozi from this Mo-Meng framework and investigate his thought in its own
right.
Accordingly, in the first part of this essay, I will focus on the three “Impartial
Care” chapters and examine the exact meaning of Mozi’s jian’ai. I will argue that
there are three different layers in jian’ai: Impartial Care1, Impartial Care2, and Impar-
tial Care3. To give a brief summary, Impartial Care1 is the basic level, applying to all
people in general; Impartial Care2 is a form that is a little more demanding, applying
to the ruling class; and Impartial Care3 is the most demanding form, applying to the
ruler, who is responsible for all the people in his state. In the second part, based on
this analysis of Mozi’s jian’ai, I will investigate to what extent Mengzi’s criticism of
Mozi was accurate and to what extent his criticism misrepresented Mozi’s doctrine
of jian’ai. In the final part, I will point out an important ethical implication of Mozi’s
jian’ai in the development of Chinese thought.
This reconstruction of Mozi’s jian’ai will not only show that Mozi acknowledged
the importance of particularistic obligations, such as filial (xiao 孝), parental (ci 慈),
and fraternal (ti 悌) obligations, but also suggest a distinct and plausible account of
how particularistic obligations can be incorporated into the grand scheme of Mozi’s
jian’ai.9 This new understanding of his jian’ai will also contribute to a comparative
study on ethical and political ideas between Mohism and Confucianism.

II. Mozi’s Jian’ai 兼愛

In the concluding remark of the “Impartial Care I” chapter, Mozi said “I cannot but
encourage people to airen 愛人,” because airen can remove the disorder and bring
harmony to the world.10 In Mozi’s sense, airen means “to take care of other p ­ eople.”11
How, then, did he conceive of himself as being able to make people actually take
care of others? In my view, it is through his doctrine of jian’ai. Simply put, airen is the
main goal of Mozi and jian’ai is his peculiar way of achieving this goal.12
What exactly is his doctrine of jian’ai? Some scholars think that this term is ques-
tionable, first because the title “Jian’ai” of the three chapters was given by later edi-
tors, and second because the term jian’ai itself appears only once in the final chapter
of the three.13 Instead, many scholars point out that the complete formula of Mozi’s
doctrine is “jian xiang ai jiao xiang li” 兼相愛 交相利: the first part is about taking
care of (ai) and the second part is about benefiting (li) others. Moreover, an analysis
of certain terminology in the three chapters of “Impartial Care” shows the ­complexity
involved with the term jian’ai. For instance, we find the term “jian xiang ai” in all
three chapters, but the term “jian’ai” appears only once in the main body of the final
chapter. In the second and third chapters, jian xiang ai is combined with another
phrase, “jiao xiang li,” which does not appear in the first chapter. And, the term
“jian” alone starts to appear in the second and third chapters, and in the final chapter
the new term “bie” 別 is introduced as an antonym of “jian” (see table 1).
Table 1 supports Carine Defoort’s hypothesis that the triplet of “Impartial Care”
evolved from I to II and to III.14 In my view, jian xiang ai is the essential doctrine of

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 Table 1

“Impartial Care I” “Impartial Care II” “Impartial Care III”

兼相愛 兼相愛 兼相愛

X 兼相愛 交相利 兼相愛 交相利

相愛 相愛 X

X 兼 兼

X X 別

X X 兼愛

Mozi because it appears in all three chapters. In the second and third chapters, this
basic doctrine of jian xiang ai is elaborated with another phrase, “jiao xiang li,”
which neither changes the original meaning of jian xiang ai nor adds any important
meaning.15 In the later chapters, the terms jian and jian’ai are introduced to indicate
jian xiang ai.16 In other words, the original formula of Mozi’s doctrine is jian xiang
ai, and jian’ai and jian are its abbreviations.
Accordingly, in order to understand Mozi’s doctrine of jian’ai, we need to under-
stand the meaning of jian xiang ai. My claim is that jian xiang ai is composed of two
parts: first, the word xiang 相 defines the essential characteristics of Mozi’s ai, care,
and second, the word jian 兼 prescribes the scope to which xiang’ai should be ap-
plied. I will first turn to the term xiang’ai 相愛, and then to the word jian 兼.
The term xiang’ai appears in the earliest stratum of the triplet “Impartial Care I.”
And partly in “Impartial Care II” and completely in “Impartial Care III,” it is sub-
sumed under the complete formula of “jian xiang ai.” The reason why xiang’ai has
not drawn due attention from scholars is because of the chapter title “Jian’ai” and
also because, unlike the obscurity of the term jian’ai, xiang’ai has been rendered
clearly as “mutual care” between people.17 However, a close examination of the
­usages of xiang’ai in the Mozi shows that it has an additional implication. First,
look at the passage from “Impartial Care I,” which describes why the world falls into
chaos:
If we examine where disorder arises from, it arises from not xiang’ai. . . . [1] A son takes
care of himself and does not take care of his father, and so he disadvantages his father and
benefits himself. [2] A younger brother takes care of himself and does not take care of his
older brother, and so he disadvantages his older brother and benefits himself. [3] A min-
ister takes care of himself and does not take care of his ruler, and so he disadvantages his
ruler and benefits himself. . . . [4] A father takes care of himself and does not take care of
his son, and so he disadvantages his son and benefits himself. [5] An older brother takes
care of himself and does not take care of his younger brother, and so he disadvantages his
younger brother and benefits himself. [6] A ruler takes care of himself and does not take
care of his minister, and so he disadvantages his minister and benefits himself. How is
this? These are all caused by not xiang’ai.18

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 In a disordered world, people do not take care of each other; a son does not
take care of his father and a father does not take care of his son. Obviously, this is a
lack of mutual care between son and father. And yet, there seems to be a more
­fundamental cause of disorder in Mozi’s account. When Mozi states that each indi-
vidual does not practice xiang’ai, he also means that a son only takes care of himself
and does not take care of his father, a younger brother only takes care of himself and
does not take care of his older brother, a ruler only takes care of himself and does
not take care of his minister, and vice versa.19 Consequently, “not xiang’ai  ” means
that one’s care is unidirectional toward oneself: I only take care of myself, but not
others. In Mozi’s view, these self-interested individuals are the ultimate source of
disorder, and in ­order to solve this problem, he urges people to practice xiang’ai:
one should take care of another person as one takes care of oneself. Here, xiang’ai
refers to bidirectional care, my concern for myself and my concern for another. Thus,
xiang’ai can be interpreted as my impartial treatment of my well-being and another’s
well-being.
I agree that xiang’ai refers to mutual care between two parties, but my argument
here is that within this conventional sense of mutual care, xiang’ai has another im-
portant implication. In other words, we can discern xiang’ai as having two dimen-
sions, collective and individual: from the perspective of a group, xiang’ai refers to
“mutual care” between son and father, between younger and older brothers, and
between ruler and minister (xiang’ai2), and from the perspective of individual agents,
xiang’ai refers to “impartial care,” giving equal weight to my own well-being and
that of another (xiang’ai1).20 In order to achieve mutual care between two parties
(xiang’ai2), individual agents in each party should practice impartial care (xiang’ai1).
In short, impartial care is a prerequisite for mutual care, and the two are not ­mutually
exclusive; rather, the notion of mutual care embraces the notion of impartial care (see
figure 1).
By discerning this embedded meaning in xiang’ai, we can have a clearer under-
standing of Mozi’s teaching. Mozi argued that by each individual’s practicing impar-
tial care (xiang’ai1), one can divest oneself of self-centered concern and take care of
another person, and this will lead to mutual care between people (xiang’ai2).21 As a
result, in order to bring order to the world, it is important to realize this preliminary
stage of xiang’ai, “impartial care”: giving equal weight to my well-being and that of
another.
However, what should be noted is that when Mozi exhorted us to take care
of another as we take care of ourselves, he did not speak of a kind of reflexivity im-
planted in the Golden Rule: “Treat others as you would like others to treat you.” The
Golden Rule is a moral injunction to use one’s own desires as a guide to how to
treat others, and this directly concerns the content of actions with respect to other
people.22 On the other hand, Mozi’s impartial care (xiang’ai1) is not about the con-
tent of actions, but about the basic attitude that we should take toward other people.
Benjamin Schwartz made a salient observation concerning this point. Based on a
short passage in the “Canons and Explanations I” — “the love of oneself is not for the
sake of using oneself, not like loving a horse” — Schwartz wrote:

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 To the later Mohists, love by no means excludes love of oneself. Just as one, in loving
oneself, does not think of oneself as a means to other ends, one should have the same
attitude toward other human beings.23

Accordingly, Mozi’s impartial care enjoins us to take care of another for his/her own
sake in the same way that we take care of ourselves for our own sake. This does not
necessitate that my well-being and another’s well-being should be congruent in con-
tents. For instance, even though I crave beer, I should not feed beer to a baby, be-
cause the well-being of a baby is different from mine. Thus, in practicing impartial
care, I should feed milk to a baby. In addition, my obligation to support another’s
well-being is also defined differently depending on what kind of relationship I have
with that person. For instance, I have a filial obligation toward my parents but I have
a parental obligation toward my children, and things that are required for filial obli-
gation and parental care are, to be sure, different from each other.24 These d
­ ifferences
in our obligations to various individuals will be explained below.
At any rate, from the perspective of an individual agent, xiang’ai is putting my
well-being and another’s well-being on an equal footing. It is not only in our dealings
with particular others, such as our family members, that we should practice impartial
care. Mozi points out that in addition to particularistic relationships, we should also
practice impartial care in our dealings with individuals or groups to whom we do
not have any specific or special ties. I call this a non-particularistic relationship.
In simple terms, non-particular others are just unrelated strangers. In his diagnosis of
a disordered age, Mozi also mentions our relationships with non-particular others.
He explains that people do not practice impartial care in their dealings with non-­

Figure 1

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particular others, and so they only favor their state, their family, and themselves.25
This results in wars between states, usurpations between families, and stealing be-
tween individuals.26 In order to bring an end to disorder, Mozi advocates that we
should practice impartial care: giving equal weight between my well-being and
­another’s, between my family’s well-being and another family’s, and between my
state’s well-being and another state’s. The logic of impartial care is exactly the same;
the only difference is the characteristic of the context to which impartial care is
­applied, that is, particularistic relationships or non-particularistic relationships.
Moreover, it should be noted that Mozi’s primary emphasis in the case of non-
particularistic relationships is not simply about mutual care between states, between
families, or between individuals. For example, in Mozi’s explanation:

[1] A thief takes care of his own household but does not take care of the households of
others, and so he plunders other households to benefit his own household. [2] A robber
takes care of himself but does not take care of others, and so he robs others to benefit
himself. Why is this? All these cases arise from not xiang’ai.27

Here, I do not think that Mozi loosely means a lack of mutual care between a thief
and other households and between a robber and others. Rather, he precisely means
that a thief does not practice impartial care and so plunders other households, and a
robber does not practice impartial care and so robs other people. Hence, what Mozi
means by “not xiang’ai  ” is a unidirectional care of oneself, one’s own household, or
one’s own state.28 If we take xiang’ai to mean mutual care between a thief and other
households and between a robber and others, not only does it not diagnose the
­problem accurately, but it also does not provide us with a precise prescription for
disorder.
Suppose, as a ruler, I take care of the neighboring state as my own state (xiang’ai1),
but the ruler of the neighboring state only takes care of his state (not xiang’ai1) and so
he wages war on my state. Under such circumstances, I cannot but fight with him. In
order to solve this problem, Mozi would prescribe that the neighboring state’s ruler
and I should practice mutual care; nonetheless, this prescription should be applied
more fittingly to the ruler of the neighboring state, who does not practice impartial
care. Since I have already been practicing impartial care, once the ruler of the neigh-
boring state takes care of my state as his own state, then mutual care between us will
be achieved. Thus, in order to realize mutual care, it is preliminary and prerequisite
for an individual “I” to practice impartial care with whomever I encounter in the
course of life. Once each ruler, each head of family, and each of us individually prac-
tices impartial care, there will be mutual care between states, between families, and
between individuals, and so will there be harmony in the world.
In addition to particular others and non-particular others, Mozi mentions ­another
type of human relationship: the “power-relative relationship.”29 This refers to a case
in which there exists between non-particular others a substantial gap in physical,
economic, political, intellectual, or collective power: strong-weak, rich-poor, noble-
lowly, smart-foolish, and majority-minority. Mozi’s diagnosis is that in a disordered
world those in superior positions tend to take advantage of those in inferior positions.

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 Therefore, Mozi urges that it is particularly important for those in power to practice
impartial care, taking care of those without power as they take care of themselves:
If the people of the world all practice xiang’ai (impartial care), the strong would not sup-
press the weak, the many would not coerce the few, the rich would not despise the poor,
the noble would not disdain the lowly, and the cunning would not deceive the foolish.
Within the world, in all cases, there would be nothing to cause calamity, usurpation, re-
sentment, and hatred to arise because of the existence of xiang’ai (impartial care).30

Here again, xiang’ai is not used as mutual care between the strong and the weak and
between the rich and the poor, but rather it is used as impartial care that should be
practiced by the strong, the rich, the noble, the smart, and the majority.
To summarize, we can discern three types of human relationships discussed in
the Mozi: particularistic relationships, non-particularistic relationships, and power-
relative relationships. Mozi’s teaching on xiang’ai exhorts us to practice impartial
care in each of these relationships: as a son, I should give equal weight to my well-­
being and my father’s well-being (a particularistic relationship); as a ruler, I should
give equal weight to the well-being of my state and that of other states (a non-­
particularistic relationship); and as a powerful person, I should give equal weight
to my well-being and the well-being of the weak (a power-relative relationship). At
least up to this point, Mozi’s teaching on xiang’ai remains within each distinct rela-
tionship, and I think the word jian 兼 refers to the inclusiveness of all human relation-
ships where we should practice impartial care, xiang’ai.
Interestingly, the word jian does not appear in the section of text where Mozi
describes the disorder of the world. In that part, only “not xiang’ai” is used to de-
scribe each particular case. When xiang’ai is prescribed as a cure for the ills, the
word jian is attached and formulated as “jian xiang’ai”:
Suppose people in the world practice “jian xiang’ai  ”; they will take care of other people
as they take care of themselves.

[1] Then, [if ] they will treat [the well-being of ] their father, brother, and ruler like their
own [well-being], how could they not be filial [to their father, not be respectful to their
brother, not be loyal to their ruler]?

[2] Then, [if ] they will treat [the well-being of ] the households of others as [the well-being
of ] their households, who would steal [from the households of others]?

[3] Then, [if ] they treat [the well-being of ] other states as [the well-being of ] their state,
who would attack [other states]?31

I take “jian xiang ai” as a general formula: Mozi renders it as “Take care of others as
one takes care of oneself.” And I take the following cases as specific applications
of this general formula in various relationships. In other words, I take “others” in a
general formula as a generic term for all human relationships that we encounter in
our lives; and so, “others” can be father, brother, ruler, other families, other states, or
those in inferior positions. Accordingly, the word jian, which originally means “to
include” or “to embrace,” refers to all of these human relationships where we should

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practice impartial care. Therefore, I think jian delineates the scope of care, and xiang
defines the nature of care; Mozi’s doctrine of “jian xiang ai” can be rendered as
­“Inclusive Impartial Care.”
At this level, Mozi’s xiang’ai emphasizes the basic attitude that we should take
in each distinct relationship in order for our care to take place: impartial treatment
between my well-being and the well-being of particular others, between my well-­
being and the well-being of non-particular others, and between my well-being and
the well-being of inferior others. Furthermore, obligations that are expected in the
three types of human relationships are defined differently from one another. First, my
obligation to particular others is specific to the person to whom it is exercised: filial-
ity to my parents, parental care to my children, loyalty to my ruler, generosity to my
subject, and so on. Second, unlike this kind of positive duty to particular others, my
obligation toward non-particular others is defined in a negative form: not attacking
other states, not usurping other families, and not injuring or stealing from others.
Third, my obligation to diverse groups of people in inferior positions appears to be a
negative duty because Mozi advises not to suppress the weak, not to despise the
poor, not to deceive the foolish, and so on. However, other passages in the Mozi also
encourage more active and positive duties toward those in inferior positions. For
example, Mozi says, if people practice impartial care:
Then, those with acute hearing and those with keen sight will help each other to see and
hear; those with strong and powerful limbs will help them in action; and those who
­understand the Way will instruct them.32

Those with physical strength are supposed not merely to refrain from overpowering
the weak, but also actively to help those in need of physical support; and those with
material wealth are supposed not merely to refrain from despising the poor, but also
actively to help those in material need.33 Therefore, our obligations in power-relative
relationships are both positive and negative duties or a mixture of the two.
In this respect, Hui-chieh Loy’s classification of care is conducive to understand-
ing the layout of obligations prescribed in the Mozi. Loy divides Mohist care into
three levels in terms of the degree of stringency: benefiting, helping, and not harm-
ing.34 According to Loy, helping is a more restricted version of benefiting. For exam-
ple, in our attempt to benefit our parents, there would be no limitation; on the
contrary, in our helping the poor, the most pressing task is to relieve the urgent need
and guarantee a minimal support. If we apply these to the three types of human rela-
tionships, then: benefiting is a strong positive duty toward our particular others; not
harming is a negative duty toward non-particular others or groups; and helping is a
moderately positive duty to those in special need or critical condition.
So far, I have discussed Mozi’s xiang’ai as promoting an impartial attitude that
one should take in each distinct relationship. By giving equal weight to another’s
well-being as my own, I can take care of diverse groups of individuals and fulfill
various obligations to them. I call this “Impartial Care1.” All three chapters of “Im­
partial Care” start with the description of disorder, and present Impartial Care1 as
a remedy for disorder. However, in the chapters “Impartial Care” II and III, Mozi’s

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 i­mpartial care does not just remain within each relationship, but extends beyond it.
According to Mozi, the impartial person is a person who would say:

I have heard that in order to be a superior person ( gaoshi 高士) in the world, one must
regard [the well-being of ] one’s friend as one regards one’s own [well-being]; one must
regard the parents of one’s friend as one regards one’s own parents. Only in this way can
one be a superior person.35

The first part seems to be in line with Impartial Care1: in my dealings with my friend,
I should give equal weight to my well-being and my friend’s well-being, and thereby
I feed him when he is hungry, clothe him when he is cold, nurture him when he is
sick, and bury him when he dies.36 These obligations to my friend are also closer to
helping than to benefiting. The second part, however, does not fit well in the scheme
of Impartial Care1. Here, my relationship with the parents of my friend is intermedi-
ated through my relationship with my parents. In other words, unlike in Impartial
Care1, which directly discusses my relationship to others, here two different relation-
ships come into one scheme. I will call this Impartial Care2 (see figure 2). In Impartial
Care2, the well-being of the parents of my friend is analogized with the well-being of
my parents. However, Mozi does not provide a clear account of what I should do
with respect to the parents of my friend.

Figure 2

Nevertheless, we can glean Mozi’s answer by comparing the versions of Impar-

tial Care1 and Impartial Care2. Suppose there is a beggar on the street.37 In the scheme
of Impartial Care1, I should practice impartial care and fulfill my non-particularistic
obligation to the beggar by not despising him and also giving some money to him. In
the scheme of Impartial Care2, however, my relationship to the beggar is analogized
with my particular relationship: if the beggar is an old man, then the analogy is with
my own parents; if the beggar is a young orphan, then with my own children. As a
result, I would not just be satisfied with my fulfillment of a non-particularistic obliga-

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tion to minimize his hardship, but I would try to do much more. This seems to say
that I should give equal weight to my non-particularistic obligation and my particu-
laristic obligation; that is, I should fulfill a kind of filial obligation even to those
who are not my own parents, and I should fulfill a kind of parental obligation even
to those who are not my own children.38 Impartial Care2, in short, is to take care of
others as if they are your particular others.39
To sum up, at the basic level, Impartial Care1 enables us to launch our various
obligations toward other people: filial obligation to my parents, parental care to my
children, charitable donations to the poor, and so on. However, at the second level,
Mozi’s emphasis goes beyond each distinct relationship, and he exhorts us to take
care of strangers as much as we take care of our particular others. Accordingly, Im-
partial Care2 moves toward “equal ethical obligations to all.” What is noteworthy is
that those who aspire to become a superior person would not just remain at the level
of Impartial Care1, but would seek to perform a more demanding form of Impartial
Care2. As might be expected, the level of impartial care becomes much more inten-
sified with regard to rulers, those who aspire to rule the world. I call this “Impartial
Care3.”
Mozi writes that an impartial ruler would say, “I have heard that an enlightened
ruler of the world certainly gives priority to the persons of the ten thousand people
and puts his own person second.”40 A ruler who practices impartial care is not mere-
ly treating himself and his people impartially, but is putting the interests of his people
before his own. Moreover, responding to the complaints that jian’ai is impracticable,
Mozi enumerates various examples of sage-kings who had already practiced impar-
tial care in person. If we look at these examples, the impartial care of sage-kings
appears to be much more demanding and even daunting.
For example, the Great Yu 禹, the sage-king whom Mozi seems to have venerated
highly, was famous for never returning home for a period of thirteen years of flooding
because he was so busy developing and implementing flood control for his people.
He abandoned his particular ties with his own family, albeit temporarily, on behalf
of his people. He might be the one who corresponds to Mengzi’s description of
­Mohists: “If by rubbing his whole body smooth from head to heel he could have
benefited the world, he would have done it.”41 Similarly, by quoting the Book of
Documents (Shangshu 尚書), Mozi compared King Wen’s 文 impartial care with that
of the sun and moon: “[His impartial care] is like the sun and moon, which illumi-
nate the whole world without having any special concern [for anyone].”42 The focus
of this passage is twofold: all-inclusiveness and impartiality. This kind of king’s impar-
tial care puts the well-being of all his people on equal terms. Hence, in governing,
King Wen showed no partiality to his parents or brothers.43
This level of Impartial Care3, putting universal obligations as one’s top priority, is
a kind of impartial care that is demanded specifically of rulers. Accordingly, it is not
surprising that Masayuki Sato translates jian’ai as “Kingly love for all” because he
interprets it as the virtue of a ruler rather than the virtue of ordinary people.44 I think,
at this level, jian’ai can be translated as “Universal Care.” When A. C. Graham trans-
lated jian’ai as “Concern for Everyone,” he noted that “universal love” is misleading

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 because the word jian implies “for each” rather than “for all.”45 However, I think, it
is exactly for this reason that Mozi’s jian’ai is also associated with “universality”: a
ruler should take care of all his people in impartial ways. As a consequence, we can
say that Mozi’s jian’ai embraces all three elements of impartiality, inclusivity, and
universality.
Furthermore, a ruler’s practice of Impartial Care3 is important not only because
it is the ruler’s responsibility to take care of all his people, but also because he is the
most influential figure in the world. Throughout the chapters of “Impartial Care” II
and III, Mozi continuously emphasizes that once rulers favor impartial care, people
will naturally practice impartial care.46 In order to demonstrate this point, Mozi em-
ploys a set of bizarre anecdotes. To quote Bryan Van Norden’s summary:

A ruler who “was fond of slender waists,” and whose subjects, in consequence, “ate no
more than one meal a day and became so weak that they could not raise themselves up
without the support of a cane nor could they walk without leaning against a wall”; a ruler
who “was fond of bravery,” and whose soldiers, when so ordered, charged onto burning
ships; and a ruler who “was fond of rough and simple attire,” so that his subjects “wrapped
themselves in sheets of cloth, wore sheepskin jackets, hats of raw silk, and hempen shoes.”47

Mozi believed that since these difficult and even absurd actions can be carried out
by people, it is much easier to put his doctrine of jian’ai into effect. Nonetheless, it
is unlikely that Mozi intended that all the people in the world should practice the
same level of Impartial Care3 as rulers. In his vision of a strictly hierarchical society,
a ruler’s practice of Impartial Care3 would have a trickle-down effect; and so, even if
people below would not be able to (or even if it were not necessary to) practice the
same level of impartial care as rulers, they would, at least, be able to practice a more
moderate form of impartial care: Impartial Care2 for the ruling class and Impartial
Care1 for the majority of the people.48 Furthermore, as Dan Robins aptly points out,
in a society where everyone practices impartial care there would not be much of a
burden for each individual.49
To conclude, as Carine Defoort points out, Mozi’s doctrine of jian’ai seems to
have developed into a radical form.50 Beginning with the simple formula of jian
xiang ai, “Take care of others as you take care of yourself,” Mozi formulated a quite
comprehensive and multilayered system.51 At the basic level, Impartial Care1 defines
the essential characteristics of his notion of care and its scope: in our dealings in all
kinds of human relationships, we should divest ourselves of self-centered concern
and take care of another person as well. By this impartial treatment between my
well-being and another’s well-being, we can carry out our various obligations to-
ward others: benefiting our particular others, helping those in need, and not harming
non-particular others or groups. At the second level, Impartial Care2 requires us to
raise the bar of our non-particularistic obligations (helping and not harming) to the
level of our particularistic obligations (benefiting): treating non-particular others as if
they are our particular others. At the third level, Impartial Care3 aims at rulers. Mozi
demands the most difficult and extreme form of impartial care from rulers: rulers
should take care of all people equally. The ruler’s Impartial Care3, however, is no

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longer captured by the formula of “taking care of others as you take care of yourself,”
but by the analogy of sun and moon: rulers should take care of people just as the sun
and moon do not have any special ties with any human beings and benefit them all
equally.

III. Mozi’s Jian’ai versus Mengzi’s Criticism

In a 1978 article Julia Ching categorized the ideas of Yang Zhu, Mozi, and the Ru,
respectively, as “egoism,” “radical altruism,” and “moderate altruism.”52 Her classi­
fication was drawn from the Mengzi. Deploring the decline of the world, Mengzi
offered the following criticism:

Once again sage-kings do not appear, the lords have become arrogant and indulgent and
unemployed scholars indulge in reckless discussions. The words of Yang Zhu and Mo Di
(Mozi) fill the world. The teachings circulating in the world all go back to either Yang Zhu
or Mo Di. Yang holds for “for the sake of oneself,” which entails denial of one’s sovereign;
Mo Di holds for “impartial care,” which entails denial of one’s parents. To deny one’s
parents or to deny one’s sovereign is to be an animal.53

According to Mengzi, Yang Zhu holds that one should work only for benefiting one-
self, whereas Mozi holds that one should care for others and treat them equally.54 In
Mengzi’s view, Mozi’s claim is rendered as follows: one should care for a stranger
as much as one cares for one’s own parents.55 Mengzi thought that this would be
the same as treating one’s own parents like strangers, and so he attacked Mozi for
not recognizing his own parents. On the contrary, Ruist ren 仁 starts from natural
affection toward one’s own parents and is extended to other people. Unlike the two
extreme views of Yang Zhu and Mozi, Mengzi conceived of Ruist ren as the most
appropriate and ideal way to relate to other human beings.
Mengzi’s stark contrast between Ruist “love with distinctions” and Mozi’s “love
without distinctions” has been tremendously influential throughout history, and so a
majority of interpreters followed Mengzi’s interpretation of Mozi. A recent example
of such interpretation can be seen in David Wong’s work. In examining the relevance
of ancient Chinese ethics to contemporary Western ethics, he introduces Christina
Hoff Sommers’ distinction between “impersonal universalism” and “particularism.”
“Impersonal universalism” assumes equal ethical pull, meaning that all beings have
the same ethical duties toward all other beings, whereas “particularism” assumes
differential ethical pull, meaning that one’s ethical duty varies according to the per-
son on whom it is exercised. Consequently, Wong aligns Ruist ren with particularism
and Mozi’s jian’ai with universalism.56 In a similar fashion, Bryan Van Norden distin-
guishes them as “agent-relative” and “agent-neutral” obligations, respectively.57
What is troubling with this kind of Mengzian contrast between the two doctrines
is the fact that Mozi did not abandon particularistic or agent-relative obligations, just
as Ruist benevolence has universalistic tendencies aiming at the extension of benev-
olence to all human beings.58 For instance, Dan Robins catalogs many cases in which
Mozi endorsed filiality as well as other particularistic obligations.59 That is to say,

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 while Mengzi thought that “equal ethical obligations to all” and “particularistic obli-
gations for one’s own kin” are incompatible, Mozi seems to have believed that they
are not incompatible.60
Some scholars have already asked this question and given us some answers. Dan
Robins recently argued that unlike the widely held view that Mozi promoted an utter
impartiality in our dealings with other human beings, Mozi’s aims were relatively
modest. He claims that Mozi not only acknowledged our special commitments to
filial piety and other particularistic virtues, but also cherished them as Mohist core
values. According to Robins, this is possible because Mozi’s jian’ai was not proposed
at the individual level but at the collective level, and in a society where everyone
practices jian’ai as collective norms, there would be no undue burdens for each in-
dividual.61 From a different angle, Hui-chieh Loy touches upon the same issue. By
giving a careful analysis of Mozi’s main argument for jian’ai, he also suggests that
Mozi’s care might not have meant open-ended benefiting. However, he concludes
that Mozi’s argument has a critical flaw: Mozi failed to provide a practical solution
to our dealings in particularistic relationships.62 Starting with a similar question,
­Robins and Loy, however, arrived at different conclusions.
I do not agree with these aspects of Robins’ or Loy’s account of Mozi’s doctrine
of jian’ai. As seen in my analysis, I do not think that Mozi made the modest claim for
which Robins argues, and I do not think that Mozi failed to take into account partic-
ularistic obligations as Loy claims. My claim is that Mozi’s jian’ai is a complex and
multilayered system that promotes universal obligations and, at the same time, incor-
porates particularistic obligations into its own system. By reconstructing Mozi’s doc-
trine of jian’ai, I have shown how these two kinds of obligations can be nicely
integrated in Mozi’s system. I have argued that Mozi’s jian’ai consists of three levels.
At the basic level, Impartial Care1 applies to each distinct relationship we encounter
in our lives. By practicing Impartial Care1, we give equal weight to the well-being of
another person and to our own, and this enables us to fulfill our various obligations
toward others. In other words, Impartial Care1 is necessary even for the fulfillment of
our particularistic obligations. Accordingly, Impartial Care1 does not necessarily con-
flict with the Ruist emphasis on particularistic obligations such as filiality, brother-
hood, and loyalty.63
Nevertheless, Mozi’s Impartial Care2 turns into something similar to what M­ engzi
criticized. At this second level, our encounter with non-particular others is interme-
diated through our relationship with particular others, and Mozi exhorted that in
dealing with non-particular others, we should not merely help them, but try to b ­ enefit
them as much as we benefit our particular others. In this respect, Mengzi’s criticism
of Mozi was not completely mistaken, but rather pretty much spot on. Furthermore,
not only Mengzi but also Mozi himself broached the Mengzian charge concerning
filial obligation: jian’ai is unfavorable or even detrimental to one’s parents. However,
in what Van Norden dubbed the “Filial Piety Argument,” Mozi explains:64

Nonetheless, the words of those in the world who condemn jian’ai still never stop. They
say, “Would it be filial that [if one practices jian’ai,] one does not benefit one’s parent’s

1104 Philosophy East & West

 but harm them?” Master Mozi said, “For the moment, let us examine the case in which a
filial son considers his parents. I do not know, when a filial son considers his parents,
whether he would also wish others to take care of and benefit his parents or he would
wish others to hate and harm his parents. Looking at it from basic principles, he would
wish others to take care of and benefit his parents. In this case, then, to what would I give
priority in order to attain this? Should I first take care of and benefit the parents of others
and expect them to respond to me by taking care of and benefiting my parents? Or should
I first hate and harm the parents of others and expect them to respond to me by taking care
of and benefiting my parents? Certainly, I should first take care of and benefit the parents
of others and expect them to respond to me by taking care of and benefiting my parents.
This being the case, then, those who try to be a filial son have no other option but to take
care of and benefit the parents of others first.65

It is quite striking to note Mozi’s assertion in the end: in taking care, we should put
the parents of others first and our own parents second. This being the case, Mozi even
makes the claim that we should give priority to non-particular others over our partic-
ular others.
However, Mozi’s reasoning behind his conclusion is complex and intriguing.
The basic assumption of the passage above is that this person is a filial son, mean-
ing that he is prepared to practice impartial care and fulfill his filial obligations
­toward his parents. What Mozi seems to take issue with here is that this fulfillment
of filial obligations is still from the perspective of a son: “I” take care of “MY” par-
ents. What if he shifts his standpoint and takes the perspective of his parents? His
parents will certainly be served well by their own son, but what about outside their
home? Is their well-being secured in these respects as well? Accordingly, if their
son is truly a filial son in Mozi’s sense, he has to divest himself of his self-centered
concern for his parents and consider their well-being on their behalf. This is com-
pletely in line with the notion of Mozi’s Impartial Care1, taking care of another in
the same way I take care of myself unconditionally. Thus, Mozi answers his own
question: “He [who is a filial son] would wish others to take care and benefit his
parents as well.”
This leads Mozi to admonish us that we should take care of the parents of others
as if they are our own parents.66 The phrase budeyi 不得已, “have no choice but to”
or “against one’s heart,” suggests that even Mozi did not take it as an easy task.
­Nevertheless, since he believed that our care of others will be reciprocated with the
same kind of care from them, we can attain the complete well-being of our parents
only through taking care of the parents of others.67 Accordingly, just as Mengzi criti-
cized, Mozi did make a claim that we should take care of strangers as much as we
take care of our own parents. However, Mozi conceived of our universal obligations
as a way to fulfill our particularistic obligations. Therefore, Benjamin Schwartz is
completely right in saying:
Without universal love of all (civilized?) mankind, even the partial loves of family group
and of separate states are inconceivable. Only when universal love is in place do the
various loves which pertain to particular groups and individuals become possible. One
can proceed only from the whole to the parts.68

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 Schwartz explains that according to Mozi’s view, we can fulfill particularistic obliga-
tions only through universal obligations. However, Schwartz is half-right in saying, “It
is only with universal love that partial loves become possible and yet remain within
their proper limit.”69 I think that by carrying out universal obligations, our particular-
istic obligations do not just remain within proper limits, but are fulfilled in a more
secure and substantial way because the well-being of our particular others will be
ensured in every respect. As a result, we cannot say that Mengzi was completely
wrong in accusing Mozi’s jian’ai of “love without distinctions,” but still, his simple
appraisal prevents us from understanding a more detailed and nuanced picture of
Mozi’s thought.
In light of this, we can offer an answer to the “lifeboat scenario,” a thought ex-
periment that Bryan Van Norden employed to dispute Mozi’s “filial piety argument.”
Van Norden writes:

Suppose we are on a sinking ship, with one other family and one lifeboat left on board,
and there is room for only one family in that lifeboat. In such exigent circumstances, Ruist
graded love requires that I attempt to secure the lifeboat for my own family.70

Unlike the plausible Ruist view, Van Norden thinks that Mozi’s argument failed to
provide us a reason to be impartial. First, if I save my own family, this is not following
Mozi’s instruction to be impartial. Second, if I save the other family instead of my
own, this is denying the very premise of the argument that I am a filial person. As a
result, Van Norden concludes that Mozi’s argument is self-contradictory and self-­
defeating.71 However, my interpretation is different. First, even if I save my own
­family instead of the other family, Mozi would not consider it to be blameworthy. For
he believed that we are supposed to fulfill our particularistic obligations by practic-
ing Impartial Care1. However, Mozi would not consider it to be praiseworthy, either.
A praiseworthy action for Mozi would be saving the other family instead of my
own family: practicing Impartial Care2. Nevertheless, he would have reasoned that
although I cannot but sacrifice my family in this particular case, my fulfillment of
I­ mpartial Care2 will increase the chance of security for my other family members in
general.72 In other words, in my absence it is more likely for my particular others to
be saved in future lifeboat cases. As a result, for Mozi, saving my family instead of the
other family would still be a workable option in his scheme, and saving the other
family instead of my own could be a supererogatory duty.73
Lastly, Mozi’s Impartial Care3 also draws our attention: despite his fierce attack
on Mozi’s jian’ai, we can hardly imagine that Mengzi would deny or oppose the
portrayals of various sage-kings that Mozi provided in order to defend the practica-
bility of jian’ai. As a matter of fact, both Mozi and Mengzi appealed to a similar set
of sages and texts to impart moral authority to their teachings. The analogy of sun and
moon, illustrating the level of Impartial Care3 of King Wen, came from the Book of
Documents, one of the sources Mengzi also heavily relied on.74 Apparently, Mengzi
would not disagree much with Mozi’s emphasis on the immense responsibilities on
the shoulders of rulers.

1106 Philosophy East & West

 Nevertheless, we find an interesting difference between Mozi and Mengzi: first,
the Great Yu seems to get more of the spotlight in the Mozi than in the Mengzi, and
second, the account of Shun’s devotion to his family seems to be absent in the Mozi.
These differences are quite telling with respect to their views on rulership. In the Ru
tradition, Shun was renowned exactly for his unremitting respect and love for his
father and family. He never harbored hatred or held any grudge against his wicked
stepmother and stepbrother, despite their several attempts to kill him. In addition,
Mengzi tells us a hypothetical story that if his father murdered a person, Shun would
have abandoned his throne like an old shoe and fled with his father.75 It is, above all,
Shun’s excellence in particularistic values that made Yao appoint Shun to be his
­successor. On the other hand, we cannot find any account in the three chapters of
“Impartial Care” or anywhere else in the Mozi that Mozi venerated the completion
of particularistic obligations as sagely virtue. As Impartial Care1 tells us, the fulfill-
ment of particularistic obligation is just the rudimentary requirement for all people in
general. Instead, for Mozi, it is exactly the thirteen years of hard work of Yu, prevent-
ing floods for his people, that made him a true sage-king: he was engaged in the task
of benefiting the world and removing disorder from it.
Therefore, even if they appealed to a similar set of sages, the ideal ruler envi-
sioned by Mozi and Mengzi would be different from each other. Likewise, they
would not disagree much in terms of their ultimate goal — achieving a harmonious
society — but they paved completely different routes to realizing their goal. Just as
Mozi considered the fulfillment of universal obligations to be the most secure way
to fulfill particularistic obligations, Mengzi conceived of perfecting particularistic
values to be the most important ground for putting a heavy burden of universal obli-
gations on someone’s shoulders. In other words, for the Ru, those who can truly care
for their own particular others can be in charge of humanity, whereas for Mozi, those
who can go beyond their particular ties can take responsibility for humanity. To
­rephrase Schwartz’ expression: it is Mozi’s “from the whole to the parts” versus Ru’s
“from the parts to the whole.” Then, the ideal societies of Mozi and Mengzi, which
can be achieved through different routes, will turn out to be completely dissimilar
from each other.

IV. Conclusion

I have tried here to make sense of Mozi’s doctrine of jian’ai and argued that Mengzi’s
simple appraisal of “love without distinctions” cannot capture the complexity of
Mozi’s thought. I argue that Mozi’s jian’ai is composed of three levels of impartiality,
and these levels have close connections with social class. The most demanding form,
Impartial Care3, is required of rulers, and the next demanding form, Impartial Care2,
of the ruling class. Once superiors set the exemplary practice of impartial care, peo-
ple below will fulfill various obligations, benefiting their own family members, not
harming or stealing from other people, and helping people in need — in other words,
Impartial Care1. In this way there will be no disorder in the world.

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 According to this system of Mozi’s jian’ai, Mengzi’s criticism applies mostly to
Impartial Care2, taking care of strangers as much as one’s own family, and less so
to Impartial Care3, the responsibility of rulers. On the other hand, Mengzi’s criticism
does not apply to Impartial Care1, which fully acknowledges our particularistic obli-
gations.76 What is missing in this Mo-Meng opposition is the fact that neither Mozi
nor Mengzi ignored the significance of universal obligations as well as particularistic
obligations. Rather, a major difference between Mozi and Mengzi lies in the way that
they brought these seemingly conflicting notions of universal obligations and partic-
ularistic obligations into their own systems: Mozi’s “from the whole to the parts”
versus Ru’s “from the parts to the whole.”
In my view, there is another significant implication of Mozi’s jian’ai worth men-
tioning. That is his realignment of human relationships. In the Mozi we find almost
all possible human relationships that constitute human life, and they can be catego-
rized into three groups: particularistic, non-particularistic, and power-relative rela-
tionships. This comprehensive discussion of human relationships was unprecedented
in early China. For example, what was mainly discussed in the Lunyu was particular-
istic relationships, such as between son and father and between ruler and subject,
and, if we add one more, between teacher (Kongzi) and disciples. Many scholars
have claimed that Ruist benevolence is meant to be extended to all people within the
four seas, and Kongzi’s aspiration for the former sage-kings reflects his ardent desire
to implement the Ru ideal in the whole world. Nonetheless, the Ru configuration of
human relationships is a concentric circle: I — My family — My state — the world. In
this scheme, the significance of the relationship diminishes as it moves farther away
from the center, “I.”
Mozi, however, reshaped this concentric circle of human relationships into a
new format: a centripetal circle (see figure 3).

Figure 3

1108 Philosophy East & West

In the concentric circle of the Ru, non-particular others always stand in the periphery
and are unable to come closer to us, overpassing our particular others. However, in
Mozi’s centripetal circle, non-particular others constitute considerable parts of our
relationships, even if they occupy smaller portions in importance and frequency than
our particular others. As a result, Mozi paid careful attention to them, particularly
those who are weak, poor, lowly, foolish, and in the minority.77
Of course, it is not that the Ru were not interested in those in inferior positions in
society, but, in the Ru classics, the care of those people was almost exclusively the
ruler’s responsibility. When Mengzi emphasized the importance of the welfare
of people, particularly those who need special care — old men without wives, old
women without husbands, the elderly without children, and the young without
­parents — his advice was offered to King Xuan of Qi 齊宣王, not to people in ­general.78
It was Mozi who brought them into the ethical context of everyday life. Through his
doctrine of jian’ai, Mozi shed equal light on all human relationships as an arena
where we should practice impartial care.

Notes

My thanks to Philip J. Ivanhoe, Richard Tail Kim, Kim Sungmoon, Eirik Lang Harris,
Hsin-wen Lee, Hui-chieh Loy, and the two anonymous reviewers for insightful com-
ments on an earlier version of this article. This paper was supported by Sungkyun
Research Fund, Sungkyunkwan University, 2016.
1    –    Chapters 14, 15, and 16 of the Mozi are respectively titled “Jian’ai I,” “Jian’ai
II,” and “Jian’ai III.”
2    –    “Universal Love” is the oldest translation, but it seems to have given way to
“Inclusive Care” and “Impartial Care.” In this essay, as the title of his doctrine,
I leave “jian’ai” untranslated, but as a chapter title and also when necessary,
I translate it as “Impartial Care,” because I think “impartiality” is the very foun-
dation of Mozi’s jian’ai.
3    –    According to Franklin Perkins, whereas Kongzi might have taught his disciples
person to person, Mozi might have targeted a large public as the writing system
developed. See Perkins 2008, p. 434.
4    –    Defoort and Standaert 2013.
5    –    Mozi is considered to have lived after Kongzi and prior to Mengzi ( Johnston
2010, p. xx).
6    –    Mengzi 3A5. The phrase “love without distinctions” (ai wu cha deng 愛無差等)
is actually the words of Yi Zhi, a later Mohist, but, from Mengzi 3B9, we
see that this is also Mengzi’s interpretation of Mozi’s jian’ai. The word ren 仁
is commonly translated as benevolence or humaneness, but in comparison
with Mozi’s jian’ai, it is usually translated as “graded love” or “love with
d
­ istinctions.”

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 7    –    Wong 1989, pp. 251–272.
8    –    Note that despite Mozi’s other criticisms of Ru, such as against the Ru notion of
fate or the use of music, Mengzi pinpointed Mozi’s doctrine of jian’ai as his
main target.
9    –    For discussions of particularistic obligations in Mozi’s thought, see Loy 2013
and Robins 2012.
10    –    “Impartial Care I” (14.3). Carine Defoort suggests that among the three chapters
of “Impartial Care,” this may have been the original echo of Mozi’s thought.
According to Defoort, this is first because the remaining part of this chapter
is an interpretation of what Mozi may have meant, and second because the
saying attributed to Mozi in the following two chapters may have been em-
ployed as didactic tools rather than as his actual speech (Carine Defoort, “Are
the Three ‘Jian Ai’ Chapters about Universal Love?” in Defoort and Standaert
2013, pp. 45– 46). As for the translation of the Mozi, I generally follow Ian
­Johnston’s translation, but with modification when necessary. For the chapter
and section numbers, I refer to Ian Johnston and put these in parenthesis. See
Johnston 2010.
11    –    Carine Defoort argues that ai 愛 refers to both actions (take care of ) and feelings
(care for), but I disagree with this view. In my view, for Mozi, ai only refers to
actions (take care of ). Accordingly, I will use “to care for” and “caring” as some-
thing accompanied by emotions (the Ru notion of ai  ), whereas “to take care of”
and “care” mean only actions (Mozi’s notion of ai  ). The focus of this article is
the difference in scope, intensity, and sequence between Mozi’s jian’ai and the
Ruist ren. However, as the distinction above shows, they are fundamentally
different in nature. I will discuss the second point in another paper. See Defoort,
“Are the Three ‘Jian Ai’ Chapters about Universal Love?” in Defoort and Stan-
daert 2013, p. 36.
12    –    My speculation is that Mozi grew out of the Ru tradition, the basis of which is
ren (benevolence, glossed as “airen” in Lunyu 12.22), but he devised his own
way to solve the problem of his day by imparting a new meaning and method
to ren.
13    –    However, the term jian’ai appears in other chapters of the Mozi, such as “Stan-
dards and Rules” and “Intention of Tian.”
14    –    Defoort, “Are the Three ‘Jian Ai’ Chapters about Universal Love?” in Defoort
and Standaert 2013, pp. 35– 68. I also agree with her view.
15    –    The complete formula of “jian xiang ai jiao xiang li” also appears in the two
chapters, the “Intention of Tian I” and “Against Fate I,” and a shorter version of
the complete formula, “xiang ai xiang li” appears in “Standards and Rules.”
16    –    This analysis of the jian’ai formula suggests that the chapters on “Intention of
Tian” and “Against Fate” were written not prior to the full development of

1110 Philosophy East & West

 Mozi’s doctrine of jian’ai, and the chapter “Standards and Rules” was written
later than these chapters.
17    –    In her study, Defoort avoids the chapter title given by later editors and provides
different working titles for each chapter: “Caring for Each Other” (“Xiang’ai”
相­ 愛), “Inclusively Caring for Each Other, Mutually Benefiting Each Other”
(“Jian xiang’ai jiao xiang li” 兼相愛 交相利), and “With Inclusiveness Replace
Exclusiveness” (“Jian yi yi bie” 兼以易別), respectively (Defoort, “Are the Three
‘Jian Ai’ Chapters about Universal Love?”, in Defoort and Standaert 2013,
p. 37). Even though I think her ­attempt is brilliant, I do not think that the triplet
of “Impartial Care” needs separate titles. I agree that there is a development of
Mozi’s doctrine through the triplet, but I do not think that these steps are so
distinct that they need separate titles. ­Moreover, the term jian xiang ai appears
in all three chapters.
18    –    “Impartial Care I” (14.2).
19    –    In the passage above, it seems to me that “not xiang’ai  ” is applied to each of the
six cases. If Mozi wanted to mean a lack of mutual care between son and father,
between younger and older brothers, and between ruler and minister, it would
have been more reasonable for him to arrange the cases differently: (1) son, (4)
father, (2) younger brother, (5) older brother, (5) minister, and (6) ruler.
20    –    Mozi was not clear about these two usages of xiang’ai. However, we can at
least say that in the Mozi, xiang’ai is not always used in the sense of mutual
care. In certain contexts, it is more reasonable to take xiang’ai as impartial care.
Moreover, Huaiyu Wang also points out the two dimensions of xiang  : “The
character xiang is an adverb that denotes the ‘relation’ of an action or intention
performed between two parties or by one party toward the other” (Wang 2012,
p. 477).
21    –    However, impartial care of an individual agent is not sufficient for mutual care
because there is no requirement for the other party to reciprocate. Accordingly,
impartial care is a necessary but not sufficient condition for mutual care. Thanks
to an anonymous reviewer for this observation.
22    –    The Golden Rule is a broad concept; here, I specifically refer to the Confucian
type of the Golden Rule. For the discussion of the usages of the Golden Rule in
Confucianism, see Csikszentmihalyi 2008, pp. 157–169. For particular implica-
tions of the Golden Rule in the Lunyu, see Ivanhoe 1990.
23    –    Schwartz 1985, pp. 146 –147. The “Canons and Explanations I” chapter (40 and
42.A7) belongs to the Logical Chapters (40 – 45), which scholars consider to be
of considerably later date. However, Schwartz notes that these later chapters
are organically linked to the content of the Core chapters (8–39), and these
later Mohists tried to defend the original faith (ibid., p. 164).
24    –    In the Ru tradition, the terms xiao 孝 and ci 慈 are translated into filial piety
(required for sons and daughters) and parental affection or kindly love (required

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 for parents), respectively. However, unlike the Ru, whose emphasis was equally
on material well-being and accompanied feelings, Mozi used these terms only
in terms of material well-being rather than feelings. This is the crucial difference
between the Ru notion of particularistic obligation and that of Mozi.
25    –    It is noteworthy that these strangers can be identified differently depending
on context: e.g., myself vs. others, my family vs. other families, or my state vs.
­ ther states.
o
26    –    “Impartial Care II” (15.1).
27    –    “Impartial Care I” (14.2).
28    –    Some may argue that a thief’s case (in which he plunders other households on
behalf of his household) and a robber’s case (in which he robs other people
on behalf of his own interest) are different, because a thief still shows some
concern for his particular others, but a robber is only concerned for himself.
Nevertheless, in my view, these two cases would be considered as the same
“self-centered” actions in Mozi’s account. For Mozi, any partiality, either self-
ishness or in-group partiality, is detrimental to the harmony of the world. This
topic will be further discussed on another occasion.
29    –    We can say that in the Mozi there are two standards to identify the people we
encounter in our lives: (1) the presence or absence of particular ties and (2) the
relationship in terms of power. The most important point is that the first standard
has a lexical priority, which means the second standard cannot trump the first
one. For example, suppose there is a person A. If A has a particular tie with me,
then A is identified as a particular other and I have particularistic obligations
to the people who belong to this group. Suppose there is another person B and
this person does not have any particular ties with me. Then B is identified as a
non-particular other. My non-particularistic obligations are not to harm them.
Among non-particular others, however, there are special cases in which there
is a substantial gap between me and non-particular others in terms of physi-
cal, economic, political, intellectual, and collective power. In this case, I have
obligations to help those strangers in need of support. As a result, the two stan-
dards of human relationship in the Mozi divide our human relationships into
three groups: particular others, non-particular others, and non-particular others
in need.
30    –    “Impartial Care II” (15.3).
31    –    “Impartial Care I” (14.3). This is a shortened version; a similar pattern appears
in “Impartial Care II” (15.3).
32    –    “Impartial Care III” (16.4). Here, the first case of xiang can make sense as
­“mutual care” because the deaf and the blind can help each other. However,
interpreting the second and third cases of xiang as “mutual care” seems a bit
odd. For instance, those who understand the Way instruct those who do not

1112 Philosophy East & West

 understand the Way, rather than instructing each other. Accordingly, I think, at
least in the second and third cases, that it would be better to interpret xiang
as “impartial way,” as in xiang’ai1. So, those with physical strength help the
deaf and the blind in an impartial way, and then those who understand the Way
instruct all of them: the deaf, the blind, and those with physical strength, in an
impartial way.
33    –    There is a similar passage in “Exalting Worthies III” (10.4): those with physical
strength must hasten to use it to help others; those with material wealth must
strive to distribute it to others; and those with the Way must make an effort to
instruct others.
34    –    Loy 2013, pp. 495–500.
35    –    “Impartial Care III” (16.5).
36    –    Ibid.
37    –    Someone might argue that my example of a beggar does not fit with Mozi’s
description of an impartial person above, because Mozi discussed the relation-
ship with friends and the parents of friends. Definitely, friends are not strangers,
and so the parents of friends are not complete strangers. However, according
to Bryan Van Norden, if Mozi is arguing that one should be impartial among
family and friends, this does not fit with Mozi’s clear claim that we should be
impartial toward humans in general. Therefore, Van Norden concludes, “friends”
here refers to people in general and the impartial person is someone who can be
friends with everyone. This explains why, in the passage above, Mozi’s descrip-
tion of my obligation to my friend falls under the category of helping rather than
benefiting. In other words, in Mozi’s account, the word you 友 may not have
meant friend in the regular sense. In addition, in his “Filial Piety Argument,”
Mozi uses the example of the parents of others, instead of the parents of friends.
This passage will be discussed later. See Van Norden 2007, p. 182.
38    –    This is exactly the reason why Mengzi vehemently attacked Mozi’s doctrine
of jian’ai as not recognizing one’s own parents, because for him this would be
like treating one’s own parents like strangers. This will be discussed in the next
section.
39    –    A literal translation of the sentence Airen ruo ai qi shen 愛人若愛其身 is “Take
care of others as you take care of yourself.” However, according to Impartial
Care1, this phrase can be rendered as “Take care of others in the way you take
care of yourself” (putting equal weight on the well-being of others and your-
self  ). On the other hand, according to Impartial Care2, the same statement
can be interpreted as “Take care of others as if they are you [or your particular
others].” I cannot be certain that Mozi was clearly distinguishing these two
levels of impartial care. As the title of this article suggests, I have tried to recon-
struct Mozi’s teaching through the analysis of the Mozi text, the ideas that Mozi
himself did not put down clearly in his writings.

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 40    –    “Impartial Care III” (16.7).
41    –    Mengzi 7A26.
42    –    “Impartial Care III” (16.9). The quotation is from “The Great Oath III.”
43    –    “Impartial Care III” (16.12).
44    –    Masayuki Sato, “The Idea to Rule the World: The Mohist Impact of Jian 兼 in the
Xunzi,” Oriens Extremus 48 (2009) : 23.
45    –    Graham 1989, p. 41. Graham also points out that “universal love” is misleading
because the word love is too warm for the Mohist ai. I think he is absolutely
right in this point, and in the next section I will further explain his view that
the Mohist ai is an unemotional will to benefit people and, in another paper, a
dislike of harming them.
46    –    The implicit reasoning behind this can be gleaned from the chapters of “Exalt-
ing Unity”: once a ruler unifies the standard and rewards and punishes people
according to the standard, people will follow the standard because that can
secure their own self-interest. We can consider “impartial care” as one of the
unified standards, and this leads us to a passage in “Impartial Care III”: “If there
was a ruler who delighted in impartial care, encouraging people with rewards
and praise and intimidating with penalties and punishments, I think that the
people would just practice impartial care and mutual benefit. Then, just as fire
goes up and water flows down, it cannot be stopped in the world” (16.14).
47    –    Van Norden 2007, p. 194. The original texts are from “Impartial Care II” (15.5,
6) and “Impartial Care III” (16.14).
48    –    Logically, Impartial Care is composed of Impartial Care1 at the bottom, Impar-
tial Care2 in the middle, and Impartial Care3 at the top. However, the actual
development seems to have started from Impartial Care1 to Impartial Care3,
filling the gap with Impartial Care2 later, for the discussion of Impartial Care2
only appears in the last chapter of “Impartial Care.” Furthermore, it seems to me
that if people in the world all practice Impartial Care1, the world will regain
order and harmony. However, in order to make people practice Impartial Care1,
Mozi would have thought that people in higher political positions should prac-
tice Impartial Care2 and Impartial Care3.
49    –    Robins 2012, p. 68.
50    –    Carine Defoort argues that the evolution of the triplet of “Impartial Care” re-
flects a radicalization of Mozi’s doctrine of jian’ai in response to the external
criticisms and is also due to the internal dynamics of Mozi’s thought. See De-
foort, “Are the Three ‘Jian Ai’ Chapters about Universal Love?” in Defoort and
Standaert 2013, p. 36.
51    –    David Wong aptly notes, “Both Mohist universal love and Confucian love
with distinctions are more complex in their meaning and application than

1114 Philosophy East & West

 ­ ither Mozi or his Confucian opponents made them out to be” (Wong 2003,
e
p. 456).
52    –    Ching 1978, pp. 162–165.
53    –    Mengzi 3B9. For the translation of the Mengzi I generally follow Irene Bloom,
with modification when necessary; see Bloom 2009.
54    –    Even though Mozi used ai only at a behavioral level, referring to “take care of”
in his interpretation of Mozi’s jian’ai, Mengzi does not seem to have distin-
guished the different usages of ai between Mozi and the Ru.
55    –    Here, instead of “take care of,” I use “care for” because this is Mengzi’s under-
standing of Mozi.
56    –    Wong 1989.
57    –    Van Norden 2007, p. 179.
58    –    David Wong points out that even if Ruist graded love may fall under the partic-
ularist rubric, it is not purely particularistic. Since it aims to be extended to all
human beings, Ru’s graded love has universalistic tendencies, too. See Wong
1989.
59    –    Robins 2012, pp. 65– 66.
60    –    Graham 1989, p. 43; Van Norden 2007, p. 191; and Robins 2012, p. 65.
61    –    Robins 2012. In this respect, Robins claims that Mozi’s jian’ai is conditional.
62    –    Loy 2013.
63    –    Nevertheless, the Mohist notion of particularistic obligations and the Ruist
­notion of particularistic values are fundamentally different. As I briefly discussed
in note 11, the Ruist notion of particularistic obligations should be accompa-
nied by corresponding emotions, whereas Mozi’s notion of obligations only
refers to material well-being.
64    –    Van Norden 2007, pp. 192–194. As I pointed out in the text referenced in note
35, in this passage Mozi used the example of the parents of others, instead of
the parents of friends.
65    –    “Impartial Care III” (16.13).
66    –    From the perspective of my parents, Schwartz’ claim still holds: I should take
care of my parents’ well-being for their own sakes. However, my taking care of
the parents of others in the hope that they will repay my favor to my parents is
problematic, because I take it as an instrument for my parents’ well-being. This
conundrum needs further thinking. Thanks to Hui-chieh Loy for this point.
67    –    Philip Ivanhoe points out that Mozi shared a common early Chinese belief in
an inner psychological mechanism of stimulus and response. See Ivanhoe
1999, p. 452.

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 68    –    Schwartz 1985, p. 148.
69    –    Ibid.
70    –    Van Norden 2007, pp. 193–194. This scenario naturally assumes that I should
sacrifice myself whether I save my family or the other family.
71    –    Van Norden gives the second reason why Mozi’s argument is not convincing: a
rare case like the “lifeboat scenario” does not have much practical relevance.
However, I disagree with his view. Many cases of thought experiment are quite
improbable in real life situations, but they are employed to show us significant
moral implications of certain views (ibid., p. 194).
72    –    In Mozi’s sense of Impartial Care2, I have to treat the other family as if they are
my own family. Strictly speaking, this does not necessitate that I have a particu-
lar reason to prioritize the well-being of the other family over my own (since
they are considered equally as my family). Nevertheless, it seems to me that
putting the well-being of the other family beforehand would cancel out the
partiality inherent in my treatment of my family.
73    –    Thanks to an anonymous reviewer for this point.
74    –    Of course, this does not mean that Mozi and Mengzi held the exact same
­understanding of these ancient classics.
75    –    Mengzi 7A35.
76    –    Nevertheless, Mengzi would criticize this part, too, since as noted earlier,
Mozi’s ai and the Ruist ai are very different in nature. Accordingly, Mengzi
could have criticized Mozi’s notion of particularistic obligations as not con­
sidering the affective aspect of caring. However, at least Mengzi’s criticism of
“love without distinctions” does not capture this aspect.
77    –    This is the reason why I said Schwartz is half-right in his saying, “It is only with
universal love that partial loves become possible and yet remain within their
proper limit.” Through realigning human relationships, Mozi made significant
room for non-particularistic relationships, and this naturally sets limitations on
particular relationships.
78    –    Mengzi 1B5.

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