The Spiritual Scientific Approach To Farming: Does It Make Sense?

We continue to explore ways of tilling the land without doing any harm to the ecosystem. One of the farming system we are interested to try and maybe later on showcase to other farmers in the area is the Biodynamic system. It is not something new. Our indigenous forefathers talked about it. Still, I  had my eyebrows raised when I first heard it is gaining more and more advocates in the farming world.  But the more I thought about it,  the more it made sense. Read on and tell me what you think.

The system was first introduced in 1924 by Austrian spiritual scientist Rudolf Steiner to the industrialized world. But like I have said, the indigenous peoples have always practiced it until the western agriculture systems obliterated the practice. The system not only embraces the living ecology of the soil, but goes further, into the interaction of elements of the cosmos on the plant community.

You could say that to the degree “organic” food rises above mainstream food, so does biodynamic rise above organic - meaning it’s produce is even more vital and nutritious. Soil and plants are not only physically enriched, but are enhanced on the etheric level - in effect, aided to evolve to a higher state.

Homeopathic preparations are one of the devices used to accomplish this enhancement. Sometimes they are implanted in the soil, other times applied as a spray.

A quote from the Biodynamic Farming and Gardening Association:

“Rudolf Steiner presents a notion of science that says we can know things that go beyond what we can weigh, measure, and calculate. Science is the practice of observing phenomena and relating them in a way that correctly represents the phenomena's reality. Agricultural judgments about health, what to do where, and when to do what, best succeed when we begin to rely on a certain wisdom gained through observation and experience and when we perceive consciously and concretely the phenomena that induce life itself. 

Biodynamic farming and gardening combines common-sense agriculture, an understanding of ecology, and the specific environment of a given place with a new spiritual scientific approach to the concepts, principles, and practices of agriculture.” 


For further resources, visit the insight21 website.

A Dad's Dead Dream Comes Alive (Sticky Post)

The dream was left for dead for more than twenty years. I believe it was because, we never put claim to that dream. It was dad's dream not ours. The farm was his obsession. He wanted to develop this acres of land into one farm that people would look with awe and wish it was theirs. Even when he was already able to hire people to work out the land, the little boy who grew up tilling the soil for survival never left him. The call to go back to the land that nurtured him and get it nurtured in return was just too difficult to resist.

The farm took much time from the best years of his life. His projects for the farm seemed unending. We have come to know the farm workers pretty much. They were almost family.

It was different for us his children. Farm life was not for us. We heed another call - the call to have a life as far away from the farm as possible. Dad supported us all the way in the pursuit of our own dreams. He never did mention about wanting us to one day go back to the farm and carry on with all the work he has invested all his blood, sweat and tears.

His life was cut short without getting to see his dreams to an end. Perhaps, the only nice thing about him getting Dementia in his late fifties was the fact that it spared him of seeing his dreams for the farm go down. When he died, the dream died with him.

The farm was left to deteriorate. For more than a score, we have not spoken much about the farm among ourselves. We were all so busy with our own lives and families, the farm was the least of our concern.

I once tried to get it back to life after years of neglect but I soon gave up. It was only recently, that one of our sisters, Lina, decided to revisit dad's dream and decided to make it her own too.

The farm is now only a shell of what it used to be. What was once a place where people love to come and visit and bring their loved ones for a picnic has lost its attraction. Everything that my dad has invested on is now all gone. The farm houses my dad built are no longer there. The farm has totally been taken over by nature.

Today, the farm is slowly being restored to its former glory. A cottage has just been built. The construction of a chapel would follow. Soon other cottages would be constructed. The plan is to make the farm a refuge for tired souls, a place where people are welcome to recharge their sagging spirits.

Thanks to one spirited soul that wants to go back to the farm, the dream of a determined dad has come alive and surely will continue to live. It is not just dad's dream now. It is now a dream we share.

by Tex