Testimonial letter from Sw Deva Praghosha
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 Deva Praghosha (Andrew McConnell). It is "Exhibit A-244" 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.
 22 July 1983 To whom it may concern, A few years ago if someone told me that I would be a sannyasin of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh I would not have believed them. In fact, I am sure that I found Bhagwan only because I was not seeking. Originally I sought out a Rajneesh Meditation Center because someone told me about the meditations. For me, meditation was a means of relieving depression without a prescription. Bhagwan's meditations sounded very effective. Following the first meditation I attended, a taped discourse was played. The next time, I returned not only for the meditations—yes, they were effective--but for Bhagwan's words. In the beginning people asked me if I intended to take sannyas, and I said, "Me? Wear red? You've gotta be kidding!" Since then I have asked myself many times why I have stayed. I am a father, a teacher, and a scientist. When I see the beauty of my relationship with my daughter; when I see the love that flows into my work; when I feel the creative energy in me, I need no other answer. [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.)
