Is enlightenment only for privileged people?

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Historically, no. The Buddha himself walked away from a life of privilege to start a religion, and religions in the Iron Age were strictly for the unwashed masses. Actual privileged people had no use for religion unless they were paid theologians, whose jobs were to manage the relationship between the rulers and the ruled.

Both Christianity and Buddhism noted that wealth and privilege made it harder for people to be saved. The concept of soteriology encompasses the promise that religions make to people that believe in it, enlightenment for Buddhism and Heaven for Christians. Jesus noted that it was easier for a camel to pass through the head of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of Heaven. The Buddha could not himself find enlightenment until he’d walked away from his Earthly station as the son of a chief.

Why is this the case? Well, in Jesus and Gautama’s day one became rich and powerful by being more and more selfish. It was impossible to run a large household and exert power if one had to do all the manual labor of deriving an income yourself, you had to employ labor. The mere act of having wealth and privilege made it impossible for you to do anything but try to acquire more wealth and privilege. It was an unavoidable part of the lifestyle.

So Jesus had to say to the young man, sell all your possessions, and come follow me, for you shall have riches in Heaven. The realities of agrarian life demanded no less if what you wanted was the spiritual riches that could only be found through meditation / prayer.

It was an old struggle even in those times, Iron Age Asia, the Middle East and India. How old? The story of religion began with civilization. If you wanted something like a city, realities dictated that you couldn’t have everybody do everything. Labor specialization was needed, and there was always going to be jobs that no one wanted to do. And the people who had to do those jobs were always going to be looked down on by those who were privileged enough to not have to do them. This was the same in Israel as it was in India.

Religion allowed people to rationalize participation in the project of civilization. It was a social compact that not just allowed people to believe and participate, but also to act as a kind of pressure relief valve to express their discontent with the ruling class with. Rulers had to present themselves as being divinely worthy of their station, or people would simply stop participating. And if the engine of civilization stopped, soon afterwards you’d find foreign armies at your doorstep.

But these days, one can make a good case for wealth and privilege being more amenable to the finding of spiritual truth than the lack of it. Why? Well, our society is not built on agriculture anymore, we have an industrial one, able to provide more for all. Our society has enough surplus to where you no longer need to directly inflict violence on other people in order to maintain your position in the world. Our system of capitalism is driven by values that are not today seen as religious, but would have been seen as intensely religious by the people living in an agrarian empire.

Spiritual growth and truth can exist hand in hand with material wealth in a way that would have been virtually impossible in the Buddha’s day.