Testimonial letter from Uli Bracher
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 Dr. Uli Bracher. It is "Exhibit A-199" 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.
 Dr. Uli Bracher To whom it may concern In my quality as lecturer in the subjects sociology, philosophy and pedagogics at the 'Johann-Wolfgang-v. Goethe-University Frankfurt/Main', holding a doctorate in philosophy and a diplome in sociology, engaged in the research on and having published about the process of individuation in today's society, I have been involved in the teachings of the spiritual Master Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, Having known some of his disciples in my seminars and having read many of his lectures I want to stress the unique approach and message which this Master makes available to us today: that individuation and personal growth is not a matter of ideologies, an intellectual question, but the courage to take one's own responsabi-lity day by day. Whereas in the history of Social Sciences the critic, negative, head-oriented attitude against the existing society has always prevailed, he shows clear ways how to come out of man's misery by seeing directly the truth about oneself beyond judgements, being life-affirmative, responsible, creative, joyful. The attitude and contribution of Rajneesh's disciples as students in our university and, as far as I can see, as people engaged in social professions, is qualitatively different ; it testifies that Bhagwan reaches his people not only through the head but helps them to grow instantly and practically on all levels of their personality. It is a joy to watch them. And Rajneesh's perhaps greatest merit: to clarify for us our dark heritage of religious upbringing, freeing our mind and heart from the moral confusion and showing how the quality of religiousness which he teaches brings real transformation and liberation. I am sure that the teaching of this religious Master and the practical guidance he gives to his disciples and to whomsoever is open for it today is the most profound contribution of a man of our age to the question how we can master our lives in peace and freedom. His work earns support not only from America, but from all countries and from all conscious and responsible citizens in the East and the West. 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.)
