Testimonial letter from Sw Anand Manfred
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 Anand Manfred (Dr. Manfred Haydn). It is "Exhibit A-1331" 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.
 Dr. med. MANFRED HAYDN Swami Anand Manfred To whom it may concern I was borne in Vienna at the 9thOct.1942, where I also attended primary and grammar school. 1960 I started my studies at the medical faculty of the university of Vienr 1967 I took the doctors dergree of medicine. Immediately I became an assistant at the " I.Universitäts-Augenklinik " of the Viennese university. I remained there till 1972, when I had to absolve my compulsery military service. 1973 I moved to Zwettl a small town 120 km NW from Vienna, where I first completed my medical education as an oculist and opened then an ophthalmological practice. The district of Zwettl has about 50.000 inhabitants. To provide a proper ophthalmological care for all this people ( I am the only oculist here ) I started a new, greater and better equipped practice in the centre of Zwettl 1 1/2 years ago. My first contact to Bhagwan was a sannyasin I met in a humanistic pychological centre in Germany. There I read the first lectures and did the first meditations he created. What he said, impressed me from the first moment. So a great inquisitivnes arose in me. As result I travelled to Poona 1979 to see Bhagwan. I took spontanious sannyas, lived in the ashram, did some groups and meditations. Its difficult to describe what happend there. Something new opened to me, it came some new quality in my life. Back to Europe I continued meditation, visited different european centres, did other groups, till my second visit to Poona 1980. At this time I planed to go definitly to Poona. One year later Bhawan leaved Poona and I decided to stay in Zwettl and to do my work here. Bhagwan continues now his work in Oregon. It would be of great importance to give him the oppotunity to do it further on. His work is meaningful for so many people, may be for the whole world. He lets disappear all dualities between the religions, between different peopole, within everybody of us. In that way also illusion disappears, what is mostly painful and causes difficultie for the other. You can see in Rajneeshpuram the result of the work. The commune is growing and growing. And all projects prosper. I hope that (?)an see Bhagwan next year in Rajneeshpuram, till th(?) time my practice will be settled, so I can visit America. Please don't destroy the blooming commune by sending Bhagwan away. [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.)
