Is Money the Root of Evil?

When my parents divorced, an ugly battle ensued centered on money. My brother and I were not a consideration. At times it seemed like we were not even a thought. My parents’ drawn-out court battle fueled my rage, and the focus of my rage became money. I had no taste for, or desire to earn, money. When I discovered the writings of Gandhi, I longed to live a simpler life, one that did not have money as its pursuit. Disgusted by greed, desiring merely the minimal, I struggled with earning enough to support myself and then a family. It took me years to heal my relationship with money, and it remains a struggle for me.

Money in itself is merely a vehicle that we can use as an aid in the service of one another. It is a relational tool. When it becomes a tool for yielding power and acquisition it transforms from a benign to a harmful force. Money is merely a means for exchanging goods and services one with another, but we have placed it in a disproportional position from its original intent. Moreover, when we based our society, our economy, on the lending of money with interest, we bartered our futures.

Corporations provide a living for people, but the structure of paying low wages and charging high prices to create the greatest profit for the corporation is an anomaly that allows for those making decisions at the highest level to amass vast wealth, while its workers barely survive.

Oğuzhan KARACA, Pexels

Corporate profit has become the end versus the means. If a corporation sold its services or wares for the lowest price possible and paid its employees the highest, then it would be fulfilling its means in the world; serving the physical needs of those it employs as well as those who partake of its offerings.

Corporatism ever seeks greater profits and new markets. This situation where workers who are earning low wages has created families where all participants need to be cogs in the machine and work. What about the children – who cares for and raises them? Others may be hired to do this work while both the mother and father work to provide for the family. For many, the masses, the work is drudgery. For a few their careers bring a sense of satisfaction, a sense of accomplishment. Yet many of us work day in and day out without the feeling of getting anything done.

We also do not value the nine months, a time a woman is growing and giving her body’s energy and nourishment for new life. She requires rest, nourishment, care. In our society, a woman works up until she delivers and is then back at work within 6-8 weeks of the newborn’s life. This does not speak of valuing the woman’s role of life-giver. When providing (earning resources) is of more value to a society than the woman’s birthing a new life, that society is out of balance and will not thrive. We have stripped the value of both man and woman.

We have linked learning, education, research, and creativity with earning money. One should be able to utilize one’s talents to provide resources for one’s home and family, and one should be able to utilize one’s talents to provide nurturing for a family and creating a home. Talents need not be linked hand in hand with earning money as both providing and creating are of equal importance and value to society. The income earner shares what he or she earns with the rest of the family. The one who stays home should not feel he or she is of less value because he or she is not earning – earning is not what is important. It is the uniting together towards a common need or goal. Each brings something of value to the partnership. Nurturing a child, teaching the next generation, must be seen of as equal a value as is providing for that child.

Just in living itself one must utilize one’s talents for the betterment of not just one’s own home and family, but for the betterment of our culture, civilization, and world. Seeking the highest good in all things, one seeks the good of All.