In addition, another private visit between Kissinger and a student group is currently being arranged by Stanley H. Hoffman, professor of Government, who led the first group to the White House last Dec. 11.

The circumstances of these meetings have differed widely, but many observers feel that their overall purpose is to make it known that Kissinger is welcome at Harvard in spite of any political differences with the liberal wing of the Faculty.

According to one Faculty member, Kissinger deliberately spread the impression in Washington after May that "Harvard would never ask him back and was treating him like a pariah." Kissinger's purpose in doing this, he said, was to discredit the professors who had criticized him and to gain political mileage among Washington Republicans who would regard a snub by Harvard professors as a sign of status and reliability.

The meetings with Kissinger, the faculty member suggested, were designed to quash rumors that such a blanket rejection from Harvard was forthcoming.

This interpretation was denied by Richard Neustadt, director of the Institute of Politics, which hosted Kissinger for a briefing on Southeast Asia and China in the Faculty Club last Jan. 19.

The invitation to Kissinger to speak at the Institute, he said, had been a standing one ever since Kissinger took office. As to the widespread conjectures in Washington that Kissinger would never be allowed to return to Harvard, Neustadt added, "He told me personally that he's not the source of such rumors."

Other professors noted, however, that Kissinger had privately expressed ?ears that he would be unwelcome at Harvard, and that the initiatives from Cambridge were intended and received as a sign of reassurance to Kissinger that he could return at his convenience.

Speaking of Hoffman's suggestion for a meeting with a student group, one professor said, "If Stanley even made the slightest suggestion, he would have signed on right away."

Hommann could not be reached for comment last night.

It is certain that the meetings were conceived as more than tokens of assurance to Kissinger. According to Jerome A. Cohen, professor of Law and an organizer of the Institute of Politics gathering, Kissinger was invited by the Institute to answer questions on the progress of a memorandum urging a reconciliation with Communist China which Harvard Asian policy experts submitted to President Nixon soon after he took office in 1969.

Most sources agreed, however, that the effect of these meetings-as well as of the Government department's recent decision to hold open Kissinger's seat-was to make clear that Kissinger could return to Harvard in spite of any political differences.