Testimonial letter from Ma Devam Madhu

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 Ma Devam Madhu (Gertrud Båge PhD). It is "Exhibit A-232" 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.

Ma Devam Madhu
(Gertrud Båge)
Dalagatan 16 S-11324
Stockholm
Sweden
July 19, 1983

To whom it may concern:

I am a scientist and an artist. I have studied biology, including zoology, botonics, genetics, ecology, etology and environmental care. I graduated in endocrinology (Ph.D) 1967 at the University of Stockholm. During ten years I was a teacher at the Unviersity. After that I have been working at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm with teratology. Among other things I investigated the effects of drugs and herbicides on unborn mammals. During one year I participated in the preparation of a large exhibition of "soft" technology for the future (ARARAT) at the Modern Museum of Stockholm. I have also studied art and design, 5 years, at the Art School of Stockholm (glass and ceremics).

Most of my grown up life I have been reading psychology and "human sciences" of all kinds in order to get a whole view of life. My urge to understand myself and my fellow man led me to a workshop with a Rajneesh therapist. It was an overwhelming experience. I heard Bhagwan lectures for the first time and everything he says goes right into my heart and for the first time in my life my intellect did agree. All the scattered pieces of my knowledge and understanding of life fell into place. He is a man with exceptional gifts and knowledge and the ability to explain it. All intelligent people who get in contact with his writings are bound to be his admirers, disciples.

The war against everything that is alive inside human beings in the name of "upbringing" or religion is the root of all fighting. The teachings of Bhagwan have given me hope that this vicious circle can be broken. The love and care I met at my first visit to Rajneeshpuram this summer is unbelievable. The whole city is run by love, intelligence, humor and care for all that is alive.

As an ecologist I am impressed. The spirit of the presence of Bhagwan brings out more love and energy than I ever believed was possible. He is the adventure of my life.

[signed]
Ma Devam Madhu
(Gertrud Båge)


(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.)