... people are nothing but beggars. Inside their being there is nothing but darkness, not even a small flame of light - their whole life is without love. At the most they pretend to be loving, but their activities in life destroy their lovingness. A man who is greedy for money cannot be loving, because the greed for love is possible only if you drop the very idea of compassion. The more money you have...

...... somebody, somewhere must be becoming poorer. You have to keep yourself completely closed about the poverty that you are creating by accumulating money. How can you love your own children? How can you love your own wife? You love only money. A man of greed is bound to become loveless; he loses all juice, he becomes dry. Man is not a machine. And I am not saying that you should not be creative; I am saying...

.... Beauty is very fragile, and anyway one day she will become old and beauty will become only a long-away forgotten dream. Be practical and be pragmatic, marry the ugly woman. She has money, and money can do anything in the world. Money is the greatest miracle invented by man. As far as her ugliness is concerned, for that much money it can be tolerated. And anyway, always come home late - when it is dark...

..., whether the woman is beautiful or ugly makes no difference. And always remember that you can take her to a plastic surgeon, but don't forget money." The people who are continuously concerned about being practical, pragmatic, are the lowest kind of human beings. The highest kind of human beings are very impractical, unpragmatic. And the mystics, the poets, the philosophers, the people who have...

... make money out of them. They themselves intrinsically are so blissful that only a very few people have moved in the direction of these purposeless values. But these are the only real people; they are the very salt of the earth. The others are only wanderers in dreams. Their money, their respectability, their power, their position... all will be taken away before death. But your love, your silence...

...?" he said, "Unless I forget the whole world, and my family...." His family was a big family. His father was one of the richest men in Bengal, his grandfather was even richer. The British government had given them the title of rajah, the king, although they were not kings. But they had so much land and so much property and so much money that they were equivalent to any king; they had...

... said, "You don't understand. I have found this new cigarette, just introduced on the market. And the cigarette that I was smoking was costing double. Now with this cigarette you smoke one cigarette, and you save so much money; you smoke two cigarettes and you save so much money again. The more you smoke, the more money is saved! And I am going to smoke them because everybody has been torturing...

... me, saying, 'You don't earn.' Now you will see how much money is saved." The wife thought, "Your economics...!" She informed his friend Engels, and called him to come immediately. "Your friend seems to have gone completely mad, because this stupid thing even I can understand. How will money be saved? But he does not listen and he is just in his room smoking two cigarettes...

... together, to save money!" Engels came, took the cigarettes from his mouth and said, "Are you mad? What are you doing?" He said, "I am just trying to do something so that I need not depend on you: saving money." It was so difficult to explain to him, "Nothing will be saved, you will simply kill yourself. Yes, in figures it looks as if you smoke one cigarette and half the...

... money is saved, but in actuality there is no money saved. And just to save that money you will be smoking double, treble, four times the number of cigarettes. So in fact you will be wasting more money than you were wasting before. And money is not the question," Engels said, "I take care of it. You need not be worried about it." He was a millionaire, owned factories, and he loved Karl...

....... The whole first group was of Russians. That too is symbolic, because the whole of Russia was turning into a dictatorship. Although these people had escaped, they had the same type of conditioning and the same kind of mind. And they had not escaped from dictatorship, they had escaped because they had enough money. And that was the trouble - that it would be distributed. So with all their money they...

... play his guitar. He was thought to be sabotaging the system. He was thrown out. So all creativity was being destroyed. The commune had become just a money-creating mechanism, and the sannyasins were being used just as slaves. It was difficult for me. I had tried it - to make those people understand that this was not the reason why the communes were brought about. I had tried to explain what my idea...

... of the commune was, and said that this was not what was happening: "You may be earning money, you may be having houses, you may be making roads - but that is not going to lead people to enlightenment. Those roads don't go to enlightenment! "People's whole energy is being involved in it, and you have almost created a system which is cheating them. You are telling them, 'Work is worship, so...

... you don't need any other meditation. The work is your meditation.'" And the people thought this must be my direction. It was not. When I failed completely to convince those people to change.... They could not change because they had no interest in meditation. They had an interest in having a big empire in the world, having big money, having great power. They did not want me to speak again. That...

... problems. Finance is one of the problems, because many sannyasins who join the commune have not contributed any money to the commune. Then the commune has to work more because they have to be fed, and they have to be clothed, and they have to be housed. And if you start... the bigger the commune, the more the problems will be - which are unnecessary. You will be in conflict with society. The politicians...

... will become afraid of you, that you are so numerous that you can be dangerous to them. Then other religions may start feeling afraid of you, and they may start creating trouble, with cases in the courts - baseless, but they will waste time, they will waste money. And they will finally get you involved in such situations that you don't have any time to play your guitar, sing a song, or just sit...

... difficult for them, that for four years many of them had not come to me. They wanted to come but in the commune they didn't have money in their hands, they didn't earn. The money was centralized in the commune - and the commune had its own needs. The commune does not have a preference for your need to go and be with me for two months - and it cannot afford it either. And you are working twice the amount...

... of time you have ever worked; and you are without any money. You are left with no time of your own; and you have got into so many troubles - financial, legal, social, political - that it is just wasting your life. So if some commune is going successfully, and the people who are there are absolutely happy and contented, it is good. If some commune is going into bankruptcy and still they are pulling...

... had no decisiveness about anything. Either renounce everything... but what is the point of living in a palace and wearing rags? having all his money in a bank account and never using it because he has to live like a poor man? So he was torturing himself, he was being tortured by the wife, he was being taunted by everybody - and he belonged to the highest strata of the society. Even the czar, the...

... should not be presented in a wrong way - which is possible. Because if they are just earning money, who cares whether the translation is right or wrong? I informed the woman, "You send..." Because we don't even know: it may be happening in other countries. There are many countries which are not under the copyright convention. But we can help them, we can suggest to them, "We don't want...

... any money from you, any royalty from you, but we would like you to represent every book exactly, without any distortion." And in many countries we will have to take publication into our own hands. For example, it happened in England that one of the presses had published eight or ten books. We came to know later on that it was a Christian press, but to us it was not a problem. To them it became...

... beautiful name of spiritual slavery. A man who is attached to money is a slave. I used to know a man... I have never come across another of the same quality of attachment. He was so money mad that even if you had a one hundred rupee note, he would say, "Just let me touch it." And he would touch it as if he was touching his beloved, with such romance. It was impossible to give him money and to...

... get it back. I inquired about him from all the people who knew him. They said, "He has never returned anybody's money. And people feel full of pity. Nobody is angry about it. They just think he is insane, obsessed with money." Walking on the street on a fullmoon night, he suddenly picked up something and then threw it away and said, "If I meet this man I will kill him. The son of a...

... in the bathroom. He always avoided one old woman in particular. And I had to tell her, "He is not here." But one day I said to her, "What is the matter? Whenever you come you never find him here." She said, "There is nothing the matter. He is afraid of me because he owes me money. And naturally, I will purchase things and I will tell him, 'Deduct it from the money you owe...

... never deceived that woman that you are not in the shop. You owe money to her?" He said, "I owe money to everybody. In this whole area, nobody can say that I don't owe money to them. But you know me; I cannot return money once I get it. It is almost like a heart attack to give the money back." It is verging on insanity. All attachments although different in degree, are a kind of putting...

... yourself down and making something so important that people are ready to die for money; people are ready to die for power. People are ready to do anything to fulfill their ambition. All these attachments destroy your worthiness. They take away all that is beautiful and valuable in you. You become smaller than the things you are attached to and infatuated with. A man who has no attachment has tremendous...

......? It is perversion! It is... Love has gone into a very poisoned and ill state of affairs. It is pathological. It is uncivilised, uncultured. But this goes on happening. And these people are against materialism. But don't just listen to their words, watch their life and you will find them more materialistic than anybody else. Indians are so obsessed with money: money seems to be their god. No other...

... country worships money; in India it is worshipped. They have a special day in the year when they worship notes and rupees - that day is coming closer - Diwali. No country in the world has ever worshipped rupees and money, yet they worship. And this is not just symbolic, this is very indicative. They cling to money like anything. It is very difficult for them to be non-greedy, to leave a single paise is...

... impossible. And that's why if somebody renounces a little bit of money, he is thought to be a great man. That too is materialism. Why? If somebody has renounced money, what is the point in it? Why should he be praised? But he is praised like anything, the whole country will talk about him! He will be thought to be a great man - he has renounced money! Then money must be the greatest value. One becomes...

... great if one renounces money. If people were really spiritual, renouncing money would be that somebody has renounced his mistake, that's all. There is nothing great in it. Somebody has found that money is valueless, so he has renounced it. But there is nothing to be praised in it; he has corrected his error. He was thinking that two and two are five, now he has come to understand that two and two are...

... four. You don't go declaring that he has become a Buddha because now he knows two and two are four. Before, he was stupid; now he is normal. But in India, it is worshipped if you renounce money, because the people know how much they are clinging to money. And you call India the heart of spiritualism? This is what Indians have been teaching the whole world. Don't be deceived - this is just advertising...

.... They go on claiming all over the world that they are the heart, that they have the greatest secrets of spirituality. And they go on exploiting in the name of spirituality. And they can deceive people, and they can deceive only because, particularly in the West, people are no more materialistic. Let me explain it. In the West there is material affluence. People have much more money, better houses...

... egos. And just because he satisfies their egos, I declare that he is not enlightened, because no enlightened man will ever satisfy anybody's ego. Because to satisfy anybody's ego, is really inimical, it is poisoning him. I say things as they are. I say it is one of the most barbarous countries - ugly, materialistic. money- oriented, sex-obsessed. And I don't deny that Buddha has been here, Mahavir...

... few people are stuck in the world - in the world also there are many powers. A politician has great power, a man who has money has great power. A few people are lost in worldly powers: those powers belong to the body level. Then a few people are lost in mental powers. Then you can have clairaudience, telepathy - things like that - mind reading. But you will be lost, you will never move beyond that...

...!" And this is what he did: he stood on the pulpit where the slaves have to stand so every buyer can see them, go around and look at them, and he shouted, "Listen, all you slaves who are here! For the first time a master is for sale. If any one of you has guts, you can purchase me. And these poor fellows, four fellows you see -- they need money. And it does not matter to me where I am. My...

... individuality cannot be destroyed." There was great silence. The whole marketplace became utterly silent, because he had said, "A master is for sale." One king who had come to look for a few slaves became interested, and he was ready to pay any price. Diogenes asked the thieves, "How much do you want? Don't be shy -- just ask it. Get the money and get lost!" They got the money...

... remain miserable. Nature has no idea of money, otherwise dollars would have been growing on the trees. Nature has no idea of money; money is a pure invention of man -- useful, but dangerous too. You see somebody with much money, and you think perhaps money brings joy: look at that person, how joyous he seems to be, so run after money. Somebody is healthier -- run after health. Somebody is doing...

... not disturb me. I am perfectly happy, perfectly content. I can't think that I could have been otherwise. In any other position I would have been miserable. I don't have a home, I don't have a place to live, I don't have any money. Still, I have something that gives me absolute contentment. I have lived according to my potential, and even if death comes it will not upset me. I have lived my way. The...

... become aware of it. But fear is the very foundation of unconscious life. All your actions arise out of it. You want money, you want power, you want prestige. What are all your ambitions, except to cover up your deep hidden fear? Perhaps money may be a security, perhaps power may make you more protected, secure, safe. Your respectability, in society, your religion, God ... all these are by-products of...

... you when you feel you are falling into an abysmal abyss. God is your concentrated fear. And there are lesser gods. Money is a lesser god - more visible, hence more people cling to money. But they don't want to take any chances, so they also go on donating to the church, just to keep a bank balance in God's bank. And here they go on clinging to the money, because in life it seems money gives a...

... there is no question of fear. Have you ever thought about it - that death is the only certainty in life? Everything else may fail. Love may fail, money - you know what is happening in America. Nothing is certain. Just a few days ago the dollar was on top, the biggest and the strongest currency in the world. It will never be again. It has gone down the drain. There is no possibility for it to rise...

... have a sneeze just in the middle of the rope. You cannot say - anything is possible. And you cannot prevent a sneeze. Money is more visible. People believe in money more than in God. They may pretend that they believe in God more, but their actual life shows something else. But the reason is the same. Whether it is money or power or prestige or God or religion, the reason is the same. You are living...

... friends; we meet every day on the morning walk. He has nothing to do and he enjoys talking. So he was talking to me one day and he said, 'He has become vice-chancellor but he has no guts. He was in love with a girl and still he didn't say it. We arranged his marriage with another woman because she was bringing much money, diamonds, ornaments, gold, a bungalow, and a car as her dowry.' "So it is not...

... course he is representative of all those people - will create a bridge. And a loving bridge will create more friendship. I would like men and women to be different, equal, and yet in immensely deep love and friendship. Question 9: MONEY IS CONSIDERED ONE OF THE GREATEST INVENTIONS TO LIBERATE MAN, AND AS A MEANS IT HAS A GOOD FUNCTION. DON'T YOU THINK THAT ELIMINATING THE USE OF MONEY WILL LEAD TO...

... ANOTHER BARBAROUS WORLD? WHAT IN YOUR VISION CAN BE SUBSTITUTED FOR MONEY IN THE WORLD AT LARGE? Money is certainly one of the greatest inventions of man, and it has helped tremendously in the past. But there is a negative side of it too: money has created poverty and richness, the classes and the class struggle; money has created capitalism, money has created communism. Money has helped in many ways in...

... the exchange of things - as a means of exchange - but now its function can be taken by better means which can avoid its negative part. For example, in my perspective, instead of money as currency every society should become a commune. We can make a limit, five thousand or ten thousand... If the town is bigger then it can have two communes, three communes. But instead of a family, a commune takes...

... over. The commune takes care of the children, the commune fulfills the needs of people, and the people don't have to use money. Whatever they need, the commune fulfills the needs. Money can be used between one commune and another as a means of exchange, but not between individuals. That will destroy the distinction between the poor and the rich. And instead of currency... which is something ugly...

... exchanged; the computer can keep the accounts. And within the commune there is no need for any money or any credit cards; whatever you need the commune supplies you with. There will be different needs - there is no harm in it, all are our people - and if somebody needs cigarettes he gets cigarettes, if somebody needs beer he gets beer. Certainly nobody gets anything which is harmful to him or to the...

... purchase from another commune; whatever extra they produce they exchange with another commune - so there is no need for anybody to be poor, there is no need for anybody to live in scarcity. Money has lost its value, it is no longer needed. It has done something good, but it has also done something very bad. Question 10: A CHILD WILL ALWAYS BE HELPLESS. IT SEEMS TO BE IMPOSSIBLE TO AVOID THE CONDITIONING...

... he immediately felt himself a nonentity, while Diogenes was an authentic being. Still he tried to laugh it away. Diogenes said, "Stop laughing! Don't try to befool yourself! You can see the fact that you are missing life." And Alexander said, "Yes, sir, I can feel it. For the first time I have seen a really alive person. What can I do for you? I have enough money, I can do anything...

.... Just you say and it will be done." Diogenes said, "I don't need anything. You may have all the money in the world, but I don't have any desire, so all your money is absolutely irrelevant. But one thing you can do is stand aside, because you are blocking the sun. That's all that I can ask from you and you will be kind enough if you can stand aside." He didn't ask for anything. Alexander...

... working on yourself, you are not using the opportunity, you are not transforming yourself. And you go on finding excuses: "How can we do it? We have so many children and the wife and the husband and the parents. And we have to work in the world and we have to earn money and a livelihood." You go on making excuses. That's why my insistence is that none of my sannyasins are to leave the ordinary...

... trembling. You may keep yourself occupied in a thousand and one things and you may forget about your inner trembling, but it is there. Soren Kierkegaard is one of the most important thinkers of the Western hemisphere. What he is saying he must be saying from his own personal experience; he was very much afraid of death. He was afraid only of two things: death and money. He never earned anything. His...

... father had left a certain bank balance for him; he lived on it. Each month, on the first day, he would go to the bank and withdraw a certain amount and live on it. He lived in a very very economical way, but he was very much afraid: sooner or later the money was going to be finished - that was his constant worry. People had seen him in Copenhagen going to the bank and coming home always in a state of...

... trembling. And then death... and death is certainly related to money. People who are very much afraid of death start accumulating money as a protection - as if money can protect! People who are not afraid of death don't care much about money; they use money, but they don't care. And one strange thing happened: Soren Kierkegaard died on the road the day he withdrew the last amount of money from the bank...

.... He was coming home from the bank; this was the last amount, the bank balance was finished. The manager had said, "Next month you need not come - all the money is finished." He fell in the middle of the road - he didn't reach home - and died then and there. If money is finished, life is finished! He must have been a man of tremendous fear. When he was young he loved a woman, a very...

... thinks is going to pay. Our whole attitude about life is money-oriented. And money is one of the most uncreative things one can become interested in. Our whole approach is power-oriented and power is destructive, not creative. A man who is after money will become destructive, because money has to be robbed, exploited; it has to be taken away from many people, only then can you have it. Power simply...

... dance better, enjoy better, love better, meditate better. When he leaves this world, he leaves a better world behind him. Nobody may know him; somebody may know him -- that is not the point. But he leaves the world a better world, tremendously fulfilled because his life has been of some intrinsic value. Money, power, prestige, are uncreative; not only uncreative, but destructive activities. Beware of...

... them! And if you beware of them you can become creative very easily. I am not saying that your creativity is going to give you power, prestige, money. No, I cannot promise you any rose-gardens. It may give you trouble. It may force you to live a poor man's life. All that I can promise you is that deep inside you will be the richest man possible; deep inside you will be fulfilled; deep inside you will...

... be full of joy and celebration. You will be continuously receiving more and more blessings from God. Your life will be a life of benediction. But it is possible that outwardly you may not be famous, you may not have money, you may not succeed in the so-called world. But to succeed in this so-called world is to fail deeply, is to fail in the inside world. And what are you going to do with the whole...

... conclusion of their lives, that they were beggars. A man who is after money and power and prestige is a beggar, because he continuously begs. He has nothing to give to the world. Be a giver. Share whatsoever you can! And remember, I am not making any distinction between. small things and great things. If you can smile whole-heartedly, hold somebody's hand and smile, then it is a creative act, a great...

... always an opening... a potentiality for a thousand and one things. Many doors open and many alternatives are always present at each step -- and you have to choose, you have to feel. But if you love your life you will be able to find. If you DON'T love your life and you love something else, then there is a problem. If you love money and you want to be creative, you cannot become creative. The very...

... ambition for money is going to destroy your creativity. If you want fame, then forget about creativity. Fame comes easier if you are destructive. Fame comes easier to an Adolf Hitler; fame comes easier to a Henry Ford. Fame is easier if you are competitive, violently competitive. If you can kill and destroy people, fame comes easier. The whole history is the history of murderers. If you become a murderer...

..., destructive person it is more certain. So if you are seeking something else in the name of creativity, then drop the idea of being creative. At least consciously, deliberately, do whatsoever you want to do. Never hide behind masks. If you really want to be creative, then there is no question of money, success, prestige, respectability -- then you enjoy your activity; then each act has an intrinsic value...

... search and a symbol of inner search. Then somebody who is born in the West and is seeking God is an Indian; and somebody who is born in India and is seeking money is an American. Then there is no trouble -- then Jesus is Indian, Zarathustra is Indian, Lao Tzu is Indian, Chuang Tzu is Indian, Bokuju, Rinzai -- all are Indians. Then 'India' has a totally different meaning. I also say that India is...

... on the same lines as banks function. If you go to a bank and you need money, they will not give you any. If you don't need money, you have enough, they will come to you and they will always be ready to give you. When you don't need, they are ready to give you; when you need, they are not ready to give you. When you don't need a person at all, when you are totally sufficient unto yourself, when you...

... has happened to the woman. And men also feel cheated. They, by and by, start suspecting that the woman loves them for something else -- for money, power, security. The interest may be economical -- but it is not love. But it is true. This is how it can be; only this is how it can be! The way you are, living almost asleep, moving in a stupor, somnambulistic, this is the only way it is possible. But...