Testimonial letter from JC Whight
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 Rev JC Whight. It is "Exhibit A-28" 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 2 pages.
 Zurich, July 22, 1983 To Whom it May Concern. Dear Sir, Re: Granting of Residential Status in the U.S.A, to Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. Early this year, when your rejection of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh’s request for residential status in the United States as a bona fide religious leader first made world headlines, I wrote to you immediately from my address in Australia (Paradise Drive, Eagle Heights, Queensland 4271) setting down courteously my astonishment and deep concern at your action. To that letter I received no reply. And so now, six months later, when Bhagwan's appeal to have that decision reversed is being made, I write again; briefly now', but with every bit as deep a sense of urgency. It would be pointless to repeat the full content of that letter (even if I had it by me in Switzerland which I haven't), especially as the letter itself will be in your files. I merely refer you to it, with this brief resume, as far as I can recall, of its contents. I am a Christian Priest of the Anglican Church of Australia (corresponding to the Episcopal Church of U.S.) now in retirement after a life-long ministry as pastor and priest of many parishes; and as chaplain, teacher, and sometimes head-master of various Church Schools in Australia and the United Kingdom. I have University Degrees in Arts and Education of the Universities of Queensland and of Melbourne, and a Theological Degree of the Australian College of Theology. I am aware that the claims of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh to be a religious teacher of the stature of Jesus Christ and of Gautam the Buddha must seem altogether outrageous to conservative Christian people in the United States. I assure you they seemed just as preposterous to me also when I first heard of them. But that was before I considered his words prayerfully. And certainly since coming to love Bhagwan, I have not ceased to be a sincere follower of Jesus Christ - if anything I have come to love Jesus more deeply than ever, because now I understand him better. There is altogether no problem for me in being a wholehearted disciple of Bhagwan and remaining a wholehearted disciple and lover of Jesus Christ. The truly astonishing thing is that I have discovered deep in my heart that Bhagwan is simply another Jesus. I have come to see that Bhagwan possesses the identical inner experience - the same sense of God - consciousness - the awareness of the same power as Jesus had. The difference for me is that Bhagwan is alive and living in the United States. Certainly he speaks to me from Oregon with the same authenticity, the same authority and with even more power than Jesus ever did. But that, no doubt is because he is a fully Enlightened Master of our time, as Jesus was of his time. I am convinced that history will soon reveal to the whole world what only his relatively small number of disciples now know - that Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh is the twentieth century Messiah whose transforming work for humanity is destined to equal, if not surpass, that of Jesus Christ. It would be tragic if the United States, which up until now has a well-deserved reputation among free men everywhere as a shining light of religious freedom tolerance and compassion, should now reject one who is destined to be acclaimed as a World Religious Leader at least as significant as any the world has known. Yours faithfully, |
(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.)
