Testimonial letter from Sw Swagato
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 Swagato. It is "Exhibit A-2563" 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.
 Swami Swagato TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN For many years I had lived divided, split: although on the outside quite successful in a university career as lecturer in sociology, politically engaged etc, my personal search for the meaning of my own life had become more and more desparate, the knowledge I accumulated in my research work and which I transferred to my students had no more any contact to my real needs and my real potential. In this period I met Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh on a journey through India, and I immediately understood the root cause of my suffering: that my world consisted of thoughts, dreams, ambitions and that I was connected with my fellow beings mostly through the head, not through the heart. Bhagwan has brought back to me these two precious gifts: love, affection and joy for all the people who live around me, for all what is alive in existence, and meditation as a state to be with myself in peace, in silence, in oneness. I continue to work basically with my mind in my research work, but it feels different. I can clean and relax my mind through daily meditation and I can risk more and more to live also the other parts of my being which have been neglected before - Bhagwan's lectures are therefore an incredible source of new insights about myself. Living now in a community of Bhagwan I watch myself and my friends growing towards more responsability and experiencing a deeper joy than ever before. I have been in Poona when Bhagwan entered into silence and I have been two times in Rajneeshpuram during the two World Celebrations in 1982 and 1983, sitting with Him in silence and in this new way of communion He reaches us on a yet deeper and more subtle level. He simply lives religiousness in His silence, love, peace and thus makes these true religious qualities available to us. Yours faithfully |
(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.)
