Biodynamic Agriculture – Not only a new agriculture!
“Indeed, not many people know that during the last few decades the agricultural products on which our life depends have degenerated extremely rapidly. In this present time of transition for the Kali Yuga to a new Age of Light, it is not only human moral development that is degenerating, but also what human activity has made of the Earth and of what lies just above the Earth.” – From Rudolf Steiner’s Agricultural lectures (Introduction, pg. 3)
When I first encountered biodynamic agriculture I was enrolled in a creative writing program in the local university (I wanted to become a Poet!). I had decided to work on a small biodynamic farm for the summer and i thought what a great place it would be to have the space and inspiration to write! Well, things change a little. As the summer progressed, deepened, and heated up, i found myself so engaged with the daily rhythm of the farm – and less so with my writing. I found the nature of the community there to be so rich and unique as we were practicing new ways of living together with common interests away from the mayhem of urbanization, and discovering what was possible when people came together, gathered around the Soil, but in spiritual awakeness. This is really a ‘modus operandi’ of Biodynamic Agriculture, gathering around the Soil, to consciously take part in its healing (which becomes our healing), but with a new kind of spiritual awakeness, spiritual presence.
I was so artistically engrossed with the ‘work’ of the farm, the seemingly effortless chores, such as feeding animals, cleaning there living areas, weeding, harvesting, making and spraying the biodynamic preparations that it became a kind of ‘writing of poetry with nature’, it became a creative-rhythmic process belonging to Nature and I. It awakened a subtle spiritual awakeness in me, both for the Earth and for Myself, and this was when i realized it was more than ‘just farming’. This gave me the beginning of a true relationship to what Steiner was trying to awake in us through his agricultural lectures.
By mid-summer I was reading all the BD literature i could get my hands on, secrets of the soil, culture and horticulture, the agriculture lectures, etc..And I had been lucky enough to come across a wonderful documentary on Peter Proctor’s work with Biodynamics in India – How to save the world? One Man, One Cow, One Planet. This film was revolutionary for me as it linked my long time interest in the spiritual traditions of India to the Soil. It showed me how a society, or a culture, can be actively and wholly engaged with the land, with the Soil, while effortlessly retaining the spiritual striving of their ancestors, of their people, and do this out of a transition from destructive chemical agricultural practices. Wow!
By the end of the summer, I had participated in Native American sweat lodges, I had stirred and applied preparation 500 and 501 a numerous different occasions, I had eaten fresh biodynamic eggs, I had harvested a field of potatoes by hand, i had dropped a water pump in the river (oops!), and many other things. I had been a participant in a process of engaging with ancient wisdom, modern insight, and ‘real living’, and all in the context of a Biodynamic farm.
And, by september, I was not in my local university studying creative writing, but I was at Emerson College in the UK studying Biodynamic Farming. How things do change!
Why is Biodynamic agriculture ‘not only a new agriculture’? Yes, Rudolf Steiner did give the agriculture lectures to practicing farmers, gardeners, and veterinarians based on the reality of the time – soil depletion, crop failures, unhealthy livestock, etc. but I believe there was a little more to it than what meets the eye. He was not merely a scientist who had studied agroecology and by deductive measures created these fairly eccentric remedies for Nature, he was not simply looking to create the most efficient food production system, and he was not anticipating global warming for all survival purposes. He was creatively engaged with Consciousness and with Spirit, and by these means he led himself to insights of Intuition that would awaken the Earth, that would awaken the Human Being. I believe that we cannot expel Biodynamic agriculture from the context of Anthroposophy to understand it as a way of farming. Although there is a large feeling among young people like myself to work with and develop anthroposophy in a new light, away from the dogmas that have created themselves, biodynamic agriculture, to stay true to its impulse – and to become a true impulse in new minds and souls, must always have the possibility of Remembering its essential task as a real Art, a real creative work of body, mind and soul. It cannot always be labeled or practiced in such a way that only fits the scheme or the chaos of the present agricultural armageddon. It does, of course have the ability to most effectively transform the ‘Food and Climate Dilemma’ of our time, but we must not loose our ability to recognize and experience its essential spiritual task to lighten consciousness through the great interface with the earth, our Mother Earth. There is a beautiful subtle way of being totally engaged with something practically – as a real solution and Work – and yet not loosing the experience of the innate ‘Whole’ reality we belong to.
And yet, Biodynamic farming is so new, is so unique and called by the earth right now. It is a practice of today and of the future really. It is just experiencing its birth. The loveliness of farming, of farming biodynamically, of growing healthy vegetables and grains, and of raising healthy livestock, can be assisted and enhanced by the active participation in the biodynamic principles. We can develop active intuitive relationships to the preparations, but we can also use the context of the farm, of the interface of what is Human, Animal, Plant, and Mineral, to strengthen our meditative life, the attendance to consciousness. Biodynamic is not only a new agriculture, it is a new method of discovering what it is to be Human, but to be Human in a relationship with the Earth and the Cosmos.
“So tonight as we look up at the evening sky, with the stars emerging against the fading background of the sunset, we think of the mythic foundations of our future. We need to engage in a shared dream experience.
The experiences that we have spoken of as we look up at the starry sky at night, and as, in the morning, we see the landscape revealed as the sun dawns over the earth – these experiences reveal a physical world but also a more profound world that cannot be bought with money, cannot be manufactured with technology, cannot be listed on the stock market, cannot be made in the chemical laboratory, cannot be reproduced with all our genetic engineering, cannot be sent by e-mail. These experiences require only that we follow the deepest feelings of the human soul…..Within the universe, the planet Earth with all its wonder is the place for the meeting of the divine and the human.” – From Thomas berry’s Evening thoughts
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