I am neither for money nor against money. Money can purchase many things: all that is outside can be purchased with money, there is no problem about it. But money cannot lead you to the inner contentment… and that is the problem. You have to work for that.
My own observation is this: that the more money you have, the more is the possibility of becoming aware of the inner emptiness, because the contrast makes things very clear. A person who is poor inside and poor outside does not know his inner poverty.
That's why poor people look more happy, beggars look more happy than rich people, than millionaires. Why? Because the beggar is poor in both ways: poor inside and poor outside. There is no contrast. It is as if you have written on a white wall with white chalk; you cannot read. A rich man has much richness around him, and just in the middle of it all is emptiness, poverty. Because of the contrast, it hurts. It is as if you are writing with white chalk on a blackboard; it comes clear and loud.
So I am not against money. In fact, my whole approach is that only rich people can be religious. A poor person cannot be. It is very difficult for a poor person to be religious.
To be poor and to be religious needs great intelligence, very great intelligence, unique intelligence. Only then can you be religious. To read something written with white chalk on a white wall you need very penetrating eyes, but to read on a blackboard is very simple.
My analysis of the whole of human history is that a country becomes rich whenever it is irreligious. A country becomes rich whenever it is irreligious, and a country becomes religious whenever it is rich: this is how the wheel moves.
OSHO