Krishna: The Man and His Philosophy - Osho - Oshorajneesh.com

CHAPTER 7. MAKE WORK A CELEBRATION
THE FRUITS OF HUMAN LABOR. SO WE QUESTION AS: HOW WILL POVERTY GO IF MAN
ACCEPTS CELEBRATION AS THE WAY OF LIFE?
It is worth considering whether Meera’s tanpoora is the handiwork of work addicts or of those who
take celebration as a way of life. Work-addicts don’t produce a tanpoora, they produce a spade. The
tanpoora has no connection with work; the exponents of work produce a hammer, a hatchet and a
sword. The tanpoora is the creation of those who take life as play, fun. Whatever is superb in human
creation, be it a tanpoora of a Taj Mahal, is the gift of those whose way of life is celebration. These
things of beauty arise from their dreams and fantasies.
It is natural that men and women who take life as celebration should accept the help of those who
take life as work and toil. But the work-addicts can also take their work as a play, and then the quality
of their work will be very different, and so will be the quality of their lives and ways of living. I think
the laborers who put the marble of the Taj Mahal together never knew the joy that a mere look at this
marvelous piece of architecture brings to you. For the laborers who built the Taj it was merely work,
a means of livelihood. But was it not possible that the same marble could have been put together in
a celebrative way?
I love to tell this story again and again. A temple is under construction on the outskirts of a town and
a few laborers are busy cutting stones for it. A passerby stops to see what is being built. He goes to
one of the laborers and asks, ”What are you doing?”
The man was sad and serious, even looked angry with himself. Without raising his gaze to the visitor
the laborer said, ”Don’t you see I am cutting stones?”
The visitor moved to another laborer, and put the same question to him, ”What are you doing?”
This man looked sad too, but was not angry. He put down his hammer and chisel, raised his eyes to
the visitor, said glumly, ”I am earning my bread,” and resumed his work.
The visitor moved to a third workman who was engaged in the same kind of work near the main gate
of the temple. He was in a happy mood, singing. ”What are you doing, my friend?” the passerby
asked of him too.
And the man said in a very pleasant voice, ”I am constructing a temple.” And then he resumed his
stone cutting and his singing.
All three workmen are engaged in the same job, stone-cutting, but their attitude to work is quite
different from one another. As far as the third workman is concerned he has turned work into a
celebration; he can work and sing together.
I don’t say don’t abolish poverty, don’t have technology and affluence. All I say is that you can create
technology and wealth by way of celebration; It is not necessary to treat them as duty and work.
The affluence that comes with celebration has a beauty of its own You can abolish poverty through
hard and painful work, but you will remain poor in spite of your wealth. Poverty of the spirit cannot
go until you turn work into a celebration. Maybe the way of celebration will take more time, but it will
abolish both kinds of poverty – material and spiritual.
Krishna: The Man and His Philosophy 134 Osho