Capitalists.

Question - What you say goes in support of the Capitalists. Won't you say something against them?

Osho - Of course, I am going to say a lot against them. And I will have to say it because the capitalists have also played a basic role in creating class conflicts. In fact, the man who becomes wealthy soon begins to think that he belongs to a different world -- different from the rest of the society. This is utterly wrong; no man becomes great by amassing wealth.

By amassing wealth no one gets to the top of the world. If a man paints a picture, he does not get to the top of the world. A sculptor does not think that he is great, but a rich man thinks himself to be high and mighty. And as long as a rich man goes on feeding his ego with riches, he will arouse the jealousy of the poor; this is inevitable. I said yesterday that the jealousy of the poor is being aroused and inflamed.

Fifty percent of the responsibility for the poor man's jealousy belongs to poverty; another fifty percent belongs to the ego of the poor man's rich neighbor. The rich man will have to give up his arrogance. Production of wealth should be his joy. But if he inflates his ego with wealth and thinks himself to be superior to others, to be a demigod, then it is inevitable that the masses around him will do everything to pull him down.

Really, wealth should not become a means to gratify the ego. On the contrary, the more wealth a man has, the more humble and egoless he should be. He should be egoless because he has gone through the abundance of wealth and found that nothing is gained by gaining wealth. Buddha and Mahavira were sons of the rich, but they renounced riches and walked away. Why?

Once Buddha was camping in a village that belonged to some other state than his father's. The ruler of that state came to see him, and he said, "I have come to remonstrate with you. Are you crazy? Why did you give up your palace, your riches, and the grandeur and glory associated with them? This is crazy! I beseech you to give up this craziness. You marry my daughter, and become heir to my state; my daughter is my only child. Give up the monk's robe and manage the affairs of my kingdom." Buddha said, "The kingdom that I left behind is larger than yours. Now don't tempt me." Then the king asked, "What is it that made you leave your kingdom?" and Buddha answered, "I realized that I had everything and yet there was an emptiness inside me which wealth could not fill."

My vision is that it is difficult for a poor man to drop his ego because he does not know that even after having riches one has nothing. But the rich man's ego should go. He alone is truly rich who has come to realize that he has everything -- riches and mansions, cars and everything that riches bring -- yet there is something inside him which is utterly empty. If you fill that emptiness with wealth, you become egoistic, arrogant. And if you see that emptiness with clarity, against the background of riches, then egolessness arises. If the rich man gives up his ego, it will be easier for the poor to shed his jealousy. But if the rich remain abundantly egoistic and arrogant, then the poor are left with nothing but Jealousy and bitterness to nurse.

The arrogance of the rich provides an opportunity to the politician to fan the jealousy of the poor. And when the politician does so, the rich man becomes more arrogant in defense. He seeks to defend his ego, what he calls his prestige, in various ways. But these ways are dangerous; they only add fuel to the fire.

No, if the country has to be rich, it is urgent that class conflict be reduced and eliminated. And this is the responsibility of the rich -- much more than that of the poor, because the poor man's jealousy is very natural while it is unnatural on the part of the rich to be egoistic. While the poor man's jealousy is real, the ego of the rich is irrational and unreal.

I remember a small story. There is a hospital inside a jail with a hundred beds where sick prisoners are kept for treatment. Like the prisoners, their beds are also numbered. The number one bed is allotted to the prisoner who is a little hefty and enjoys the favor of the jail authorities. The second bed goes to one with less influence with the authorities. The prisoner on bed number one hundred thinks himself to be a nobody, a nonentity.

The man on bed number one is chained to his cot like the others, but he has an air of arrogance about him, the arrogance of being somebody. His bed is close to the window. Rising from his bed every morning he looks out and says, "What a beautiful morning!" And all the other prisoners feel humbled before him. They think him to be the most fortunate man and feel jealous of him. And the prisoner in bed number one goes on talking. Sometimes he praises the grandeur of the full moon in the sky, at other times he describes the beauty and smell of the various flowers.

By and by the number one bed becomes the most coveted bed of the hospital, the object of ninety-nine prisoners' desires and dreams. The fellow prisoners tell the occupant of the number one bed, "You are the most fortunate one among us; you must have earned it in your previous lives," but in their heart of hearts they pray for his death. And whenever he has a heart attack -- occupants of bed number one often suffer from heart troubles -- it sends a wave of joy among his fellow prisoners and they begin to look forward to the time when he will die. But he survives, because people like him die with difficulty. And when he is a little better, he begins again his hymns of praise to the splendor of the world beyond the window. At long last the prisoner in bed number one dies.

His death sends a wave of joy among the ninety-nine prisoners, each of whom aspires for his bed. A contest starts -- as it happens in Delhi after the death of the "number one" man. A mad race is on. They flatter the officials of the jail to win their favor. They even bribe them. And ultimately the prisoner offering the largest bribe wins the race. The winner is overjoyed and soon occupies the coveted bed. And the first thing he does after occupying it is to inspect his state and surroundings. This is what one does after becoming the president of the country.

As the new occupant looks out the window, all his joys vanish into thin air. He is utterly disappointed to see that there is nothing except the massive outer wall of the prison. There is no sky, no sunrise, no flowers, no song of the birds -- nothing of those joys that his predecessor had gleefully talked about for years. And now he is in great difficulty -- how to say that there is nothing? And do you know what he said to his fellow prisoners?

He said, "Hey guys, how fortunate I am! The sun is rising, the flowers are blooming and the birds are singing." And again the rest of the prisoners say outwardly, "How fortunate you are," and secretly pray for his death as well.
I have also heard that this hospital has been there for hundreds of years, and for hundreds of years the same drama is being played again and again. And up to now no prisoner in bed number one has gathered enough courage to say the truth.

The man getting to the top of the ladder of wealth should gather courage to say that though he has amassed wealth, he has not found his soul, he has not known the truth, he has not experienced love. In fact, he should realize the utter poverty of his being and say it. Then he will cease to be the pillar of ego that he is -- and, with the cessation of ego, he will also cease to inflame the jealousy of the poor. If class conflict has to be removed, the rich man will have to drop his arrogance and come down from his imaginary height.

Man does not become great because of wealth. A clerk in an office is not small because he is a clerk. To be really human is altogether different. It comes with the richness of being, which has nothing to do with outer richness. And the man who has no respect for this inner richness harms the society in many ways. The rich man should know that wealth does not make for inner richness. He should also know that God resides within the poor too. He has not to look down upon the poor man as if he is an animal. Only then we will extinguish the fire of class conflict. And this fire can be extinguished. And the country can engage itself in creativity, in the production of wealth, only if class conflict disappears.

Source - Osho Book "Beware of Socialism"