Point System (Description)

The point system is based on the ideal farm, the qualitative description of which was prepared by Jenni Muir, based on the Agriculture course.

A farmer must first be knowledgeable in being a farmer, and adopt as many sustainable practices as he can:  

• Creating a self-sufficient farm organism

• Producing all animal food on the farm

• Practicing good pasture management/pasture rotation

• Utilizing ground covers and leaving no bare soil

• Creating a diverse habitat for beneficial insects

• Planting green manure crops

• Planting seeds, transplanting, saving seeds

• Companion planting

• Rotating crops

 In addition, the following is of utmost importance:

• Utilizing Steiner's preps, and field sprays & producing all or part on the farm

• Preparing manures, composts, and potting soils made with those preps

• Using plant and manure teas

• Using Steiner's ashing techniques

In our experience, the quality of produce can be judged by their effect on human life, being as beneficial and health giving as possible - promoting human life.  A farmer engaged in only the materialistic side of farming may produce large and colorful produce, however, without the spiritual forces present in the food, it is but a mere filler to the body - to move though the body and be discarded, without ever taking up the vitality of the forces in the food in the right way.  Likewise, the food will quickly rot, and attract insect pests to itself quiet readily.

The interaction of our soul and spirit with everything that is around us, when we walk our land and become intimate with our soil and plants, makes us ever more receptive to the mysteries at work.  In nature, everything is in mutual interaction with everything else.  We develop sensitivities to the more intimate interactions and processes in nature; we observe things in such a way that we see all living things in their place, and each thing's importance within the overall farm organism.  It is important to see these things on a spiritual basis.  It is impossible to assess the world of living things solely from a materialistic view.  We need to look at the spirits activity in nature. We must gain this insight into the way substances and forces work, and in the way the spirit works. This is the way we acquire spiritual knowledge. 

There is a whole world beneath the surface at work.  There are various plants like legumes, busy inhaling oxygen and nitrogen, so that they can give nitrogen to other plants who need nitrogen.  Lime drawing everything into itself, silica being somewhat undemanding, and clay mediating between lime and silica.  Steiner taught us these spiritual matters.  He also taught us how to cultivate sensitivity to the different fragrances that come from plants growing on the ground, those that come from orchards in bloom, and those that come from woodlands.  This way, we learn to tell whether the atmosphere around a plant is poor or rich in astrality.  For the tree makes the spiritual atmosphere around itself richer in astrality.  A tree is inwardly poorer in ether than small plants that grow closer to the ground, which in turn influences the trees roots to become much more mineralized, and draw some of the ether from the soil around them.  This makes the soil more dead around trees, than around plants.  And if there were no trees, then there would be no insects, because trees make it possible for insects to exist.  We must strive to understand these inner workings of nature, and the intimate relationship that exists between everything.

We must consider the relationship of planetary and lunar rhythms to the life span and decomposition of plants. We must gain this knowledge of the effects of the stars in a spiritual way, and not just by means of the physical senses.  We need to understand how water, or warmth can enhance, or restrain the influence of the planets, and the role of silica and lime in mediating the influence of the planets.  Ashing techniques for keeping harmful animals and insects at bay, in earlier times were known as star knowledge.  The ashing techniques for unwanted plants were of a lunar influence.  We cannot understand the plants and animals on earth in isolation; we must look to the entire universe, for nature is a unity, with forces working in from all sides.

We must also look at nature in a broader sense, such as the spiritual nature of the elements (protein, sulfur, carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen), and their physical carriers.  Oxygen being the carrier of life; nitrogen, the carrier of astrality, carbon being the carrier of all nature's formative processes, and sulfur being the carrier of the spirit.  Steiner implored us to get to know the elements in their deeper nature.  Steiner felt materialists only see the physical carrier and forget about the spirit.

We must enliven our soil directly by use of manure or compost that can retain the proper amount of nitrogen and become vitalized; then transmit this vitality to the soil. 

I believe it is necessary to study Steiner's work, beginning with the Agricultural course, in order to develop a deeper understanding of these spiritual matters.  I also believe we should set aside quiet time each day for meditating.  We must come to understand just how powerful our thoughts are, and learn to use them in a spiritual way to develop and manage our farms.  There are other realms in nature we will come to discover and interact with when we begin to practice spiritual farming.  We will find it is a continual learning environment, full of new insights.  We learn to see with new eyes, and to listen with new ears, to what the plants and animals need to grow healthy.