Testimonial letter from Ma Devapriti
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 Devapriti (Susan E. Coles). It is "Exhibit A-1043" 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.
 2E Van Swinden Straat 76 To Whom It May Concern: As a professional musician and disciple of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh for over four years, I would like to testify as to his being a remarkable man, not only as a spiritual teacher, but as a person of outstanding intellectual ability. In 1979 I was awarded a B.A. Honours’ in "performing Arts" from Middlesex Polytechnic in North London where I specialized in acting and singing. I then continued my post graduate studies in opera at the Sweelinck Conservatorium Amsterdam. At present I am singing professionally with the Netherlands Opera Foundation based in Amsterdam. During the last four years I have had first hand experience of the teaching methods and meditaion techniques of Rajneesh, and seen their effects upon anyone intelligently and open mindedly adopting them. The main thing I learned during this time, which has been one of the most important contributing factors in helping me reach my present career situation is as follows: Bhagwan has said many times that when performing any job of work, not to think of the end results but to concentrate only on the present situation of the job at hand. In this way one becomes totally immersed in the act of working. This message is especially important to all performing artists. The emphasis in their work is always concentrated on the end results; i.e. the performance. Through their constant struggle to satisfy the public, the critics and their own expectations and egos, they are in great danger of losing their self identity. Following this simple message not only relieves the anxiety and self doubt suffered by many artists but it allows them to concentrate more deeply in their own solitary studying and the rehersals which take up most of their time thus improving the quality and depth of their music making to a great degree. The evidence of this can not only be seen in the quality of playing of the musicians who live and perform in Rajneeshpuram but also by those many professional musicians all over the world who have had contact with Rajneesh. Since I came into contact with Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh this improvement has also occurred within my own work which, instead of being a mere means of earning money or fame and recognition, has now become a constant source of inspiration and joy to me. Yours sincerely, |
(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.)
