Testimonial letter from Sw Deva Prashantam
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 Prashantam MA. It is "Exhibit A-390" 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.
 Swami Deva Prashantam, M.A. Dear Sir, I respectfully thank you for your attention to this letter, which is to support the request of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh for permanent residency in the U.S.A. My University qualifications as well as professional experience and the multitude of my travellings around the world, put me in a position to strongly assert that Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh is a person of exceptional ability as a religious teacher and spiritual leader. My qualifications are: Furthermore I am fluent in seven languages: English, French, German, Japanese, Portugese, Spanish, Italian. In continuation of my studies and quest for truth I have studied in Japan for 2 years (1974-1975) ZEN Religion and Philosophy and I am today an accomplished Zen Flute player and Shiatsu practioner, having studied with the ZEN MASTER KOKU NISHIMURA SENSEI, Head-Master of the TANI-HE sect. My search has continued through retreats in monasteries in Korea, Taiwan, the Phillipines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Laos, Malaysia, Nepal and many other Far-East countries with ancient and well-established traditions. I have read thousands of books, studied old scriptures, listened to discourses of many masters and wise-men, looked into holy caves and temples. I meditated for more than 10 years, worked and lived in under-developed countries and was close to the people and their problems and life situations. Also, at the age of 17 years old, I was elected European Governor for Rotaract, the young organization sponsored by Rotary International and as such I met with influencial Rotarians including several of their District Governors and Club Presidents from throughout the world. And participated in world conventions and national seminars where they discussed many subjects on human problems, particularly related with young generation crises. Although this happened quite a few years ago I still remember clearly to have been in contact with several thousands of very well-known Rotarians and competent professionals. In my professional life I worked for well-known multi-national companies such as SUMITOMO INC. - TOKYO, JAPAN, or BROKEN HILL LMT. - AUSTRALIA as well as teaching as an assistant professor at the Sorbonne University in Paris, France. BHAGWAN SHREE RAJNEESH outstands by far any other person, religious master or philosopher that I may have known of. He is loved and respected by millions all over the world and many of the religious persons I met have for Him the greatest consideration. His teachings are most helpful to many not only in the religious field, but also in many other fields such as science, arts, psychology, medicine, human behavior, philosophy, history, etc. Since I first met Him, which was more than eight years ago, His Divine guidance has helped me to be a fulfilled and responsible man. He has introduced a spiritual approach to my life which completes and enhances my human potential. Bhagwan has very specifically guided me as a meditation leader and bodytherapist. His religious books, and previously, His discourses, or His video tapes are still extremely helpfull as working tools in my professional life as a meditation group leader and established body therapist. Finally Bhagwan has shown me how to love life, how to rejoice each moment of my existence, how to live in harmony with all living creatures, how to respect nature and contribute to the well-being of Man on Earth. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh is a very rare being of the kind that can be compared only with Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, Lao Tzu. His very existence, His silent presence amidst us, is an encouragement to love, a light shining forth towards Truth, towards God. [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.)
