According to Osho, social justice demands a radical break with the religious-ideological structures that legitimize caste atrocities. Begging for entry into oppressive temples only perpetuates humiliation; dignity begins when the oppressed refuse those gods, priests, and scriptures and step out. Transformation is achieved not by patronage from above but by courageous self-respect, structural disidentification, and practical exit—even conversion—dismantling the very beliefs that normalize cruelty.
Don’t ask oppressors for permission; walk away from the system that hurts you so you can regain respect and freedom.
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…
Question: BELOVED OSHO, WHEN THE HEAD MONK, RYOSUI, WENT FIRST TO SEE MAYOKU, MAYOKU TOOK UP HIS HOE AND BEGAN TO WEED. RYOSUI WENT TO THE PLACE WHERE HE WAS WEEDING, BUT MAYOKU DELIBERATELY TOOK NO NOTICE OF HIM AND WENT BACK TO HIS ROOM AND SHUT THE DOOR. THE NEXT DAY THE SAME THING HAPPENED, BUT THIS TIME RYOSUI KNOCKED AT THE DOOR. MAYOKU SAID, "WHO IS IT?" RYOSUI HAD HARDLY UTTERED HIS NAME WHEN HE WAS ENLIGHTENED AND SAID, "DO NOT MAKE A FOOL OF ME. IF I HAD NOT VISITED YOU, I WOULD HAVE BEEN DECEIVED ALL MY LIFE BY THE TWELVE DIVISION CANON." MAYOKU OPENED THE DOOR AND CONFIRMED RYOSUI'S ENLIGHTENMENT. RYOSUI WENT BACK TO HIS PLACE OF LEARNING, RESIGNED FROM IT, AND SAID TO THE ASSEMBLED LEARNERS, "WHAT YOU KNOW, I KNOW; WHAT I KNOW, YOU DON'T KNOW.
Osho, in a country like India, where inequality and poverty have deep roots, don’t your teachings help maintain the status quo? Religion in the past offered no effective challenge to feudal injustice. How are you dealing with the apparatus that sustains poverty, unemployment, and corruption?
On the other hand, in my ashram, talent is coming from the West—and you won’t let them come. Scientists, engineers, doctors, physicians, professors want to come and live here, but Morarji Desai doesn’t want to let them in. All Indian embassies abroad have been instructed: if anyone wishes to come to my ashram, do not grant entry. And you know Indian “efficiency”... such foolishness that they even write such things in official letters. A famous dentist wanted to come and live in India. He wrote to apply, and the Indian embassy in America replied: if you wish to go to Shri Rajneesh Ashram, Poona, permission cannot be granted. They wrote that outright. What to say of Indian efficiency! At least keep it hidden. If you wish to go to any other ashram, permission can be granted. But he doesn’t wish to go to any other ashram. I could gather the…
Question: BELOVED MASTER, WHAT IS JUSTICE FOR A REBELLIOUS MAN? Raso, it is one of the most significant questions to be asked -- for the simple reason that man has never tried to remove the causes of injustice. On the contrary, in the name of justice, he has been taking revenge on the individuals who were not obedient to the social order, to the establishment, to the vested interests. They were condemned as criminals, punished -- and it was thought that justice had been restored. In fact, the people who had been punished were really the victims. Justice was not restored. In fact, the people who were the root causes of injustice in the world had taken their revenge. Their revenge was fulfilled, and people were made afraid to go against the social order in any way. It is very strange that such a long history...
Osho, have efforts toward equality begun only now, since socialism came to Russia? Haven’t inequalities existed since the world began?
The evolution of consciousness—look! In the evolution of consciousness, equality is a very highly developed state. Inequality is the ordinary state. Even to be ready to regard yourself as equal to another is a great attainment—that the other is my equal! The mind keeps saying, “How can another be equal to me?” Inequality is the natural impulse. That is why creating disparity has been the norm. Consciousnesses that create equality have appeared—Mahavira is one of them—but they were individual. Gradually their density has increased, and it has reached a point where now a substantial portion of equalizing consciousnesses is present on the earth. The day the consciousnesses with the tendency toward inequality keep waning—when that tendency keeps diminishing—on that day equality will prevail across the earth. It takes a long time. But even that “long time” looks long to us only because our reckoning of time is very small. It…