Testimonial letter from Sw Amrit Mandiro (2)
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 Sw Amrit Mandiro. It is "Exhibit A-2030" 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.
 Mandiro is also the author of another letter, also type-written and undated. There is enough commonality between the two letters to establish definitively that the same one person has written both letters, not two different people with the same name. There are 22 other such cases known. We may be amused by the illicit possibilities here but just as likely he was simply giving the organizers two letters to choose from. See also Testimonial letters#duplication for more on this. Sw. Amrit Mandiro To whom it may concern: My name is Amrit Mandiro. I 'am an artist from Puerto Rico. At this moment I am working in the city of Rajneeshpuram. I am a new disciple, I took sannyas a year ago. I started reading some of Bhagwan’s books and was amazed at his intelligence and writing ability. When I found out that he has never written a book, that all his books are his spontaneous talks to his disciples I was still more interested in him. But at this time I just enjoyed Bhagwan’s books but I wasn’t thinking of becoming his disciple. Later I had the opportunity to watch a video of him. I saw it together with my girlfriend. When I saw him I felt his presence very strongly. I saw a simple man of love and peace. It is difficult to explain or write about feelings but I trusted him at that moment. A few days later my girlfriend and I became disciples of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. We knew that he had become silent and this fact didn’t matter to us. Since our initiation our life has become more intense and beautiful. Even though he is in silence we have found his spiritual guidance all the time; sometimes through his books, and tapes of his talks, at other times an inner guidance difficult to explain. This is a place of love and peace. A city where you feel safe anywhere at any time of the day and night. A place where you see clearly into yourself and into others; where transformation for good is happening continuously. Rajneeshpuram is a green oasis in this desert land of central Oregon and a refreshing oasis for the desert land of man’s soul. We, the American people should come here and see what is being created. I feel proud that such a spiritual leader as Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh has chosen this country to live and develop his work. Truly yours, |
(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.)
