According to Osho, social justice inevitably institutionalizes violence: courts, states, and movements deem retaliatory force 'just,' so societal nonviolence remains relative and mixed with coercion. Absolute nonviolence is a spiritual, individual realization, not a workable social policy. Hence justice systems perpetuate cycles of sanctioned violence, while true freedom from violence arises only through inner transformation of individuals.
Society calls some force “justice,” so it keeps using violence, while only a person’s inner awakening can be truly nonviolent.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, what is the relationship between meditation and patience?
If you sit to meditate to remove mental restlessness, you will keep looking back again and again: “Has it gone yet?” And the irony is that when you begin to meditate, restlessness will increase. Because what has been repressed will start surfacing; catharsis will begin. The rubbish you have kept hidden within and never allowed to express—meditation will break open those doors too. It will clean the house. Dust piled up for years, for births, will rise again; there will be gusts and storms. For a while even the little peace you had will be lost. Then you will panic: “I came for peace, and even what I had is gone.” Without patience, you could even become unhinged, because meditation brings such a great storm. The disease is not from a day or two; it’s from lifetimes. Meditation will break through all the layers to reach your innermost core. In…
To endure violence is injustice, and it is not proper to endure injustice. And the slogan of nonviolence, of which I am talking about is spiritual. And if we wish to discuss social nonviolence, there will always be a relative law of nonviolence also. It will accommodate both violence and nonviolence. These two will be mixed there, it will be like a Mixed Economy. Violence and nonviolence stand side by side here; only their aspects go on changing. Complete or total nonviolence is not possible on the social level. It is extremely difficult to achieve total nonviolence even on an individual level. It is not proper even to hope when we shall achieve it on a society level and a mass level. It is as improper as to hope for self-realisation on a society mass level .
Question: BELOVED OSHO, OF JUSTICE WHEN YOU HAVE AN ENEMY, DO NOT REQUITE HIM GOOD FOR EVIL: FOR THAT WOULD MAKE HIM ASHAMED. BUT PROVE THAT HE HAS DONE SOMETHING GOOD TO YOU. BETTER TO BE ANGRY THAN MAKE ASHAMED! AND WHEN YOU ARE CURSED, I DO NOT LIKE IT THAT YOU THEN WANT TO BLESS. RATHER CURSE BACK A LITTLE! AND SHOULD A GREAT INJUSTICE BE DONE YOU, THEN QUICKLY DO FIVE LITTLE INJUSTICES BESIDES. HE WHO BEARS INJUSTICE ALONE IS TERRIBLE TO BEHOLD. DID YOU KNOW THIS ALREADY? SHARED INJUSTICE IS HALF JUSTICE. AND HE WHO CAN BEAR IT SHOULD TAKE THE INJUSTICE UPON HIMSELF. A LITTLE REVENGE IS MORE HUMAN THAN NO REVENGE AT ALL. AND IF THE PUNISHMENT BE NOT ALSO A RIGHT AND AN HONOUR FOR THE TRANSGRESSOR, THEN I DO NOT LIKE YOUR PUNISHMENT.
Osho, yesterday you spoke about justice and compassion and said that only a man of wisdom can bring compassion along with justice. Is a synthesis of justice and compassion possible?
On the basis of logic—no. On the plane of logic—no. A synthesis of justice and compassion is not possible according to logic, because they belong to two different planes. Understand. Justice means: let what is proper happen. Compassion is not included in justice. Justice only means that the appropriate rule be applied. In compassion there is the heart; in justice there is only the intellect. Compassion is the greater thing. Compassion means: let what ought to be happen. It is not about rules; it is something bigger than rules. Consider: you go to court; you have stolen. The judge looks into his books, flips the pages, searches the law. You stole fifty rupees; he looks up the penalty; the penalty is written in the book; accordingly he sentences you. He keeps his distance; he does not enter into any human relationship with you. He does not think that within you,…
Osho, continuing in the same thread, a small question: In a state of violence and in a state of nonviolence, how does the condition of the life-energy, the life force, differ?
Water rushing down from the mountains runs toward the low; it looks for ruts, ravines, lakes—it descends, it hurries downward. Then the same water, heated, becomes vapor. It starts racing toward the sky. The very same water begins to seek heights, rides upon the bosoms of clouds, sets out on the sun’s journey. The water is the same, the energy is the same, but a transformation has taken place, a revolution has happened. A violent mind seeks pits and ravines; it flows downward. A nonviolent mind becomes vaporous; it starts seeking mountain peaks, the journey to the sky begins, the upward flight begins; it sets out on the sun’s path, oriented toward liberation and the divine. The violent mind always seeks the other; the other is the abyss. The nonviolent mind seeks itself. To seek oneself is the height. For whenever we seek the other, we have already started moving…