Testimonial letter from Helena Jacoby de Hoffman

From The Sannyas Wiki
Jump to navigation Jump to search

This letter is one of a remarkable series of over 2650 letters amassed in 1983 to support Osho's attempt to get permanent resident status in the US at the time of the Oregon ranch. The image is reproduced here with the kind permission of The Oregon Historical Society. Information about their collection of these letters and other supporting material -- the "Jeffrey Noles Rajneesh Collection", named for Osho's immigration lawyer Jeffrey Noles, who compiled them in 1983 and donated them to the OHS -- can be found at this page. The wiki is grateful to the OHS for making access available for these documents. For more information and links to all the letters, see Testimonial letters.

This letter is from Helena Jacoby de Hoffman MD. It is "Exhibit A-1268" in the Noles collection.

The text version below has been created by optical character recognition (OCR), from the images supplied by OHS. It has not been checked for errors but this process usually results in over 99% correct transcription. Most apparent "errors" are correct transcriptions of typos already in the original. The image on the right in the text box links to a pdf file of the original letter, it has one page.

Santiago, July 15, 1983

To whom it may concern:

Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh is an outstanding religious teacher as well as an internationally known spiritual leader. He has dedicated his life to sharing his techniques for the evolution of man as an individual and his integration in the world. He has converted the science of life into a reverent new religion which opens up a different possibility for a positive existence.

As a scientist and investigator, as well as in my own personal search, I have become acquainted with Bhagwan mostly through his publications. The meditation techniques developed and/or adapted by Bhagwan have proved to be an effective way to gain awareness, relieve stress and enter into a self-realizing process. The integration of eastern and western ideas and religious beliefs is expressed by Rajneesh.

I am a Medical Doctor graduated in 1928 in Freiburg i. Bv., West Germany. Upon arriving in Chile, I worked in the Department of Physiology in the Medical School of the University of Chile where in 1951 I finished my studies as a psychiatrist.

I have dedicated a great deal of energy to conducting the evolution of human groups. During many years, I studied the oriental world to later adapt and translate into Spanish the German version of Richard Wilhelm of the book "I Ching". For a lifetime, I have studied comparative religions. Presently, I have been involved in the creation and guidance of an ecological group known internationally as "Planetary Iniciative for the World We Choose".

I, HELENA JACOBY DE HOFFMAN, swear that the above information given by me is true and correct to the best of my knowledge and is supplied in good faith.

[signed]


(Please note: We assume that the above letter is still copyrighted, but we regard its historical interest to constitute a Fair Use exception for publication in this wiki.)