Contemporary Media Accounts of Osho
The full spectrum of Western media came to check out Osho. Without exception they note his ‘erudition and extraordinary range of subjects’. And they also note his charisma and powerful effect on people.
The London Times, April 8, 1980. Bernard Levin, who has been described as the acerbic doyen of conservative social commentators, came away from his 1980 visit to Osho’s Ashram ‘fascinated by my experience of the man … and the people around him’. Osho, he says, is ‘a remarkable teacher… one of the most remarkable orators I have ever heard … and an extraordinary magnet’.
Vogue Magazine, September 1977: Jean Lyell of describes him in as ‘a gentle and compassionate man of complete integrity … the most inspired, the most literate, and the most profoundly informed speaker I have ever heard any where’.
The Weekend Australian, February 14, 1981:: ‘His range of reference, mood and approach can be dazzling … He is one of the most extraordinary people I have ever met … To be within a few meters of him can create a remarkable effect. Whatever its source, [Osho] is a person of remarkable power and magnetism, palpable enough to be felt ... He made me feel that perhaps Jesus might have been like this.’
German Cosmopolitan magazine: Florence Gall describes Osho as ‘charismatic in the sense of Evita Peron, Martin Luther King, John F. Kennedy and Pope John XXIII’.
‘Wicker’s World‘: Alan Wicker, the merciless commentator of this TV program, says of Osho in 1979, ‘He is very beautiful … in action he is enormously impressive.’
Dutch Panorama Magazine October 13, 1978: Marcel Meier calls Osho ‘a master psychologist with a super brain’. He adds, ‘I have never come into contact with any one quite like him except in books.’
Techniche della Meditazione Orientale (Techniques of Eastern Meditation) 1985: Claudio Lamparelli writes, ‘He reveals a brilliant mind, an exceptional talent as a speaker, a broad cultural background and the charisma of an ancient Eastern sage’.
Argentinisches Tageblatt 1980: Marielouise Alemann writes, ‘He simply refused to ride on the wave of the soft holy man and to adapt to the image of the all-knowing, compassionate master that inevitably comes to the mind of non-oriental people when the word India or guru is mentioned.’
Such impressions by people one might expect to be the most sceptical indicate that even in those comparatively early days, Osho was not just another popularised Eastern guru.
The Adelaide Advertiser (Saturday Review), August 1, 1981: Alan Atkinson. ‘[Osho] is clearly no ordinary man. He has been described as a great new spiritual seer, an Enlightened Master in the tradition of Jesus or Buddha, as the “crazy sage of Poona”, as a present day, joyful, John the Baptist – and by detractors as the Antichrist, a madman, the most dangerous man in the world. For the past couple of years his presence and influence have intrigued psychologists, psychiatrists, churchmen, journalists and professional skeptics in the West.’
See descriptions of his discourses here.
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