Testimonial letter from Sw Deva Robert
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 Robert (Robert C. Kuhn PhD). It is "Exhibit A-1708" 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.
 State of Wisconsin \ department of health and social services To Whom it May Concern, I am writing this letter in support of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh's receiving permanent visa status in this country. My professional background has been in the practice of clinical psychology. I presently work as a staff psychologist at Waupun Correctional Institution in Waupun, Wisconsin. I have a Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Wisconsin and have worked in the area of mental health for over ten years. During the last five years, my work has been strongly influenced by Bhagwan's teachings and His creative ideas concerning the practice of psychotherapy. I believe His synthesis of Eastern and Western psychology and philosophy to be one of the most significant contributions to the practice of psychotherapy in this century. Presently, the majority of the work I do here in the prison involves His ideas in one way or another. Bhagwan has talked about the importance of using life in prison as a learning experience and as a possibility to become more conscious. His teachings involve cutting the roots of life's problems; i.e. our unconsciousness, and His unique development of cathartic meditations have been especially useful here with men who have violent backgrounds and tendencies. I have had more success with these meditations than any other methods I have used. They have markedly reduced the prisoners’ stress disorders, conduct disorders and sleep blems. His philosophy and methods regarding individual psychotherapy have been equally useful. Thus, I can't say enough about the usefulness of Bhagwan’s methods since I have become aware of His ideas and teachings. We are so fortunate to have him living in this country with us. He has inspired the founding of the Rajneesh Institute for Meditation and Inner Growth at Rajneeshpuram, Oregon, the Institute at which I will be furthering my training. It is so important that He be physically present with us here, both to continue to be a source of inspiration for the Meditation and Growth Institute and to share with us His loving energy and wisdom. I look forward to seeing Him again when I return to Rajneeshpuram this fall. So I am again requesting that you support Bhagwan's continued presence in this country and that he be allowed to remain here permanently. Thank you for your attention. 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.)
