WHY MARRIAGE ?

[Guest guest]

The problem started only when a few people who were more cunning, more clever,

more powerful, had managed some property. Now they wanted their property, after

their death, to go to their own children. It is a natural desire that if a

person works his whole life and gathers property, land, or creates a kingdom, it

should go to his children. In a subtle way -- through the children, because they

are his blood -- he will be still ruling, he will be still possessing. It is a

way to find some substitute for immortality, because the continuity will be

there: "I will not be there, but my child will be there -- who will represent

me, who will be my blood and my bones and my marrow." His child will be there,

and there will be a continuity. So in a subtle sense, he will have immortality.

He cannot live forever, so this is a substitute way.

 

THAT'S WHY MARRIAGE was created; otherwise it was easier for man not to have any

marriage, because marriage was simply a responsibility -- of children, of a

wife. When the woman is pregnant, then you have to feed her.... And there was no

need to take all that responsibility. The woman was taking the whole

responsibility.

 

But the man wanted some immortality, and that his property should be possessed

by his own blood. And the woman wanted some protection -- she was vulnerable.

While she was pregnant, she could not work, she could not go hunting; she had to

depend on somebody. So it was in the interest of both to have a contract that

they would remain together, would not betray in any sense, because the whole

thing was to keep the blood pure.

 

SO MARX'S IDEA was that when communism comes, and property becomes collective,

marriage becomes meaningless because its basic reason is removed -- now you

don't have any private property. Your son will not have anything as an

inheritance. In fact, just as you cannot have private property, you cannot have

a private woman; that too is property. And you cannot have a private son or

daughter, because that too is private property. So with the disappearance of

private property, marriage will disappear.

 

After the revolution in Russia, for two or three years they tried it, but it was

impossible. Private property had disappeared, but people were not ready to drop

marriage. And even the government found that if marriage disappears, the whole

responsibility falls on the government -- of the children, of the woman.... So

why take an unnecessary responsibility? -- and it is not a small thing. It is

better to let marriage continue.

 

So they reversed the policy; they forgot all about Karl Marx, because just

within three years they found that this was going to create difficulty, and

people were not willing. People were not willing to drop private property either

-- it was forcibly taken away from them. Almost one million people were killed

-- for small private properties. Somebody had a small piece of land, a few

acres, and because everything was going to be nationalized....

 

Although the people were poor, still they wanted to cling to their property. At

least they had something; and now even that was going to be taken out of their

hands. They were hoping to get something more -- that's why they had had the

revolution, and fought for it. Now what they had was going to be taken out of

their hands. It was going to become government property, it was going to be

nationalized.... And for small things -- somebody may have had just a few hens,

or a cow, and he was not willing... because that was all that he had. A small

house... and he was not willing for it to be nationalized.

 

These poor people -- one million people were killed to make the whole country

aware that nationalization had to happen. Even if you had only a cow and you

didn't give it to the government, you were finished. And the government was

thinking that people would be willing to separate... but this is how the merely

theoretical and logical people have always failed to understand man. They have

never looked into his psychology.

 

This was true, that marriage was created after private property came into being

-- marriage followed it. Logically, as private property is dissolved, marriage

should disappear. But they don't understand the human mind. As property was

taken away, people became even more possessive of each other because nothing was

left. Their land has gone, their animals have gone, their houses have gone. Now

they don't want to lose their wife or their husband or their children. This is

too much.

 

Osho, Light on the Path: Talks in the Himalayas

 

 

 

 

 

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