Swami Anand Vimalkirti - Prince Welf Of Hanover - Osho Disciple Enlightenment and death

The year of 1981 will perhaps be recalled as the most eventful year for the ashram. It began with one more disciple of Osho’s attaining enlightenment. Thirty-three-year old Swami Anand Vimalkirti, formerly Prince Welf of Hanover, reached enlightenment on the evening of 9 January 1981. He died and attained Mahaparinirvana (freedom from birth and death) on 10 January 1981. The story of this event, in brief, is as follows. On 5 January, while Vimalkirti was doing his daily ‘warm-up’ exercises, he collapsed due to a cerebral hemorrhage. He was put on respiratory machines in a Pune hospital for five days. His mother, Princess Sophia, and his brother, Prince Georg, came from Germany to be with him. Osho paid his tribute to Vimalkirti in the morning discourse in the following words: ‘Vimalkirti is blessed. He was one of the few chosen sannyasins who never wavered for a single moment, whose trust has been total the whole time he was here. He never asked a question, he never wrote a letter, he never brought any problem. His trust was such that by and by he absolutely merged with me. He has one of the rarest hearts. That quality of the heart has disappeared from the world. He is really a prince, really royal, really aristocratic. Aristocracy has nothing to do

with birth, it has something to do with the quality of the heart. And I experienced him as one of the rarest, most beautiful souls on the earth.’ Osho wanted Vimalkirti to be kept on the respiratory machines for at least seven days, because, as Osho explains, ‘He was just on the edge—a little push and he would become part of the beyond…Hence I wanted him to hang around a little more. Last night he managed. He crossed the boundary from doing to non-doing…’ Osho also explained that because of his meditative quality, Vimalkirti succeeded in disidentifying from his body and thus attaining consciousness beyond the body. All members of Vimalkirti’s family including his wife, Ma Prem Turiya (formerly Princess Wibke of Hanover, also a sannyasin), daughter, Ma Prem Tania (formerly Princess Tania of Hanover), his father, Prince Georg Wilhelm of Hanover, mother, and brother, joined thousands of sannyasins in carrying his body to the cremation ground. While Vimalkirti’s body was burning on the pyre, everyone danced and sang in celebration. Messages of condolence were received from Queen Elizabeth II of England, H. R. H. Prince Charles of England (Vimalkirti was a nephew of the Queen and so a cousin to Prince Charles), Queen Fredericka of Greece, Mrs Indira Gandhi, and many other prominent people. 8 September was declared Mahaparinirvana Day, to be celebrated annually in memory of Osho’s father and Vimalkirti and all those sannyasins

who have left their bodies (people who have died) and who will be leaving their bodies in the future.