The Meditating Farmer

"It is not a bad thing. . . when a farmer can meditate. . . "

 

 

In my last posting, I called attention to "The Farm as an Organism" described in writings of Rudolf Steiner in Spiritual Ecology: Reading the book of nature and reconnecting with the world (2008),  selections from Steiner's lectures to farmers in 1923.

 

Matthew Barton, who compiled the readings says to conclude those dealing with farming, ". . . here is a brief but vital extract, in which Steiner as it were hands back to the farmer full responsibility for deciding what the land and the crops need.

 

"If instead of relying on directives from experts--or even a whole European Community [Barton's compilation was published in the UK]--we develop an intimate, meditative relationship with our particular farm and its environment, the right ideas and inspirations can arise, and the farmer can become what he or she should be: the farm's living consciousness and conscience."

 

Talking to Farmers

 

 

In a lecture to farmers given in Koberwitz, Silesia, June 11, 1924,  Rudolf Steiner said:

 

 

You see, if you bump your head against something hard--a table, for instance--you will only be aware of your own pain.  If, however, you rub it more gently, you will become aware of the surface of the table, its texture and so on.  It is the same when you meditate.  You gradually grow into an experience of, for instance, the nitrogen that surrounds you. . .

 

 

Receptive to What Nitrogen Can Reveal

 

 

And in fact it is at this point that the spirit in our inner meditative activity begins to acquire a certain relationship to farming. . . It is not a bad thing, you know, when a farmer can meditate and thus become ever more receptive to the revelations of nitrogen.

 

Our Agricultural Practices Can Change

 

Our agricultural practices will gradually change once we become receptive to  what nitrogen can reveal.  Suddenly we know all kinds of things--they are simply there.  Suddenly we know all about the mysteries at work on the land and around the farm. . . Take a simple farmer. . . who meditates on all sorts of things during winter nights.  And indeed he arrives at a way of acquiring spiritual knowledge, though he may not be able to express it . . .

 

 

Walking Through the Fields

 

 

As he is walking though the fields it is suddenly there.  He knows what to do, and he tries it out.  I lived among farmers when I was young, and I saw this happen again and again.  It really does happen.

 

 

Mere Intellectualism is Not Enough!

 

 

These are the kinds of things we have to pursue.  Mere intellectualism is not enough; it does not take us deep enough.  Nature's life and flow are so fine and subtle that in the end they slip right through the coarse mesh of our rational concepts.

 

 

The Mistake of Science

 

That's the mistake science has made in recent times--

it tries to use coarse conceptual nets

to catch things that are actually

much too fine for them. . .

 

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