The central truth of natural farming is that nothing need be done to grow crops. I have
learned this because non-discriminating knowledge has enabled me to confirm that nature
is complete and crops more than capable of growing by themselves. This is not the
theoretical hypothesis of a scholar in his study or the wishful thinking of an idler with an
aversion to work; it is based on a total, intuitive understanding of the reality about self
and nature wrested from the depths of doubt and skepticism in a deeply earnest struggle
over the meaning of life. This is the source of my insistence that nature not be analyzed.
Examining the Parts Never Gives a Complete Picture: This principle is extremely
important, but since it is somewhat abstract, I will illustrate with an example.
A scientist who wishes to know Mt. Fuji will climb the mountain and examine the
rocks and wildlife. After having conducted geological, biological, and meteorological
research, he will conclude that, he now has a full picture of Fuji. But if we were to ask
whether it is the scientist who has spent his life studying the details of the mountain who
knows it best, the answer would have to be no. When one seeks total understanding and
comprehensive judgment, analytic research is instead a hindrance. If a lifetime of study
leads to the conclusion that Fuji consists mostly of rocks and trees, then it would have
been better not to have climbed it in the first place.
One can know Fuji by looking at it from afar. One must see it and yet not examine it,
and in not examining it, know it.
Yet the scientist will think: “Well, gazing at Mt. Fuji from a distance is useful for
knowing it abstractly and conceptually, but is no help in learning something about the
actual features of the mountain. Even if we concede that analytic research is of no use in
knowing and understanding the truth about Fuji, learning something about the trees and
rocks on the mountain is not totally meaningless. And moreover, isn’t the only way to
learn something to go and examine it directly?”
To be sure, I can say that analyzing nature and appending to these observations one’s
conclusions is a meaningless exercise, but unless those who listen understand why this is
worthless and unrelated to the truth, they will not be convinced.
What more can I say if, when I mention that the artist Hokusai who captured faraway
images of Fuji in his paintings understood it better than those who climbed it and found it
an ugly mountain, I am told that this is just a subjective difference, a mere difference in
viewpoint or opinion.
The most common view is that one can best know the true nature of Fuji by both
listening to the ecologist speak of his research on its fauna and flora and looking at the
abstracted form of Fuji in Hokusai’s paintings. But this is just like the hunter who chases
two rabbits and catches none. Such a person neither climbs the mountain nor paints.
Those who say Fuji is the same whether we look at it tying down or standing up, those
who make use of discriminating knowledge, cannot grasp the truth of this mountain.
Without the whole, the parts are lost, and without the parts, there is no whole. Both lie
within the same plane. The moment he distinguishes between the trees and rocks that
form a part of the mountain and the mountain as a whole, man falls into a confusion from
which he cannot easily escape. A problem exists from the moment man draws a
distinction between partial, focused research and total, all-encompassing conclusions.
To know the real Fuji, one must took at the self in relation to Fuji rather than at the
mountain itself. One must look at oneself and Fuji prior to the self-other dichotomy.
When one’s eyes are opened by forgetting the self and becoming one with Fuji, then one
will know the true form of the mountain.
Become One with Nature: Farming is an activity conducted by the hand of nature. We
must look carefully at a rice plant and listen to what it tells us. Knowing what it says, we
are able to observe the feelings of the rice as we grow it. However, to “look at” or
“scrutinize” rice does not mean to view rice as the object, to observe or think about rice.
One should essentially put oneself in the place of the rice. In so doing, the self looking
upon the rice plant vanishes. This is what it means to “see and not examine and in not
examining to know.” Those who have not the slightest idea what I mean by this need
only devote themselves to their rice plants. It is enough to be able to work with
detachment, free of worldly concerns. Laying aside one’s ego is the quickest path to unity
with nature.
Although what I am saying here may seem as intangible and difficult to understand as
the words of a Zen priest, I am not borrowing philosophical and Buddhist terms to spout
empty theories and principles. I am speaking from raw personal experience of things
grounded solidly in reality.
Nature should not be taken apart. The moment it is broken down, parts cease being
parts and the whole is no longer a whole. When collected together, all the parts do not
make a whole. “All” refers to the world of mathematical form and “whole” represents the
world of living truth. Farming by the hand of nature is a world alive, not a world of form.
The instant he begins to ponder over the factors of crop cultivation and growth and
concerns himself with the means of production, man loses sight of the crop as a whole
entity. To produce a crop, he must comprehend the true meaning of a plant growing on
the earth’s surface, and the goal of production must derive from a clear vision of unity
with the crop.
Natural farming is one way to remedy the presumptions and conceits of scientific
thought, which claims to know nature and says man produces crops. Natural farming
“checks whether nature is perfect or imperfect, whether it is a world of contradiction. The
task then is to establish and prove whether pure natural farming free of all vestige of the
human intellect is indeed powerless and inferior, and whether farming based on the inputs
of technology and scientific knowledge is truly superior.
For several decades now, I have devoted myself to examining whether natural farming
can really compete with scientific farming. I have tried to gauge the strength of nature in
rice and barley cultivation, and in the growing of fruit trees. Casting off human
knowledge and action, relying only on the raw power of nature, I have investigated
whether “do-nothing” natural farming can achieve results equal to or better than scientific
farming. I have also compared both approaches using mans direct yardsticks of growth
and yield. The more one studies and compares the two, whether from the limited
perspective of growth and yields, or from a broader and higher perspective, the clearer
and more undeniable becomes the supremacy of nature.
However, my research on natural farming has done more than just point out the faults
of scientific farming. It has given me a glimpse of the disasters that the frightening
defects of modern practices are visiting on mankind.
Imperfect Human Knowledge Fails Short of Natural Perfection: Understanding the
degree to which human knowledge is imperfect and inadequate helps one to appreciate
just how perfect nature is. Scientists of all ages have sensed with increasing clarity the
frailty and insignificance of human knowledge as man’s learning grew from his
investigations of the natural world around him. No matter how unlimited his knowledge
may appear, there are hurdles over which man cannot pass: the endless topics that await
research, the infinitude of microscopic and submicroscopic universes that even the rapid
specialization of science cannot keep pace with, the boundless and eternal reaches of
outer space. We have no choice then but to frankly acknowledge the frailty and
imperfection of human knowledge. Clearly, man can never escape from his imperfection.
If human knowledge is unenlightened and imperfect, then the nature perceived and
built up by this knowledge must in turn always be imperfect. The nature perceived by
man, the nature to which he has appended human knowledge and action, the nature which
serves as the world of phenomenon on which science acts, this nature being forever
imperfect, then that which is opposed to nature— that which is unnatural, is even more
imperfect.
And paradoxically, the very incompleteness of the nature conceived and born of
human knowledge and action—a nature that is but a pale shadow of true nature—is proof
that the nature from which science derived its image of nature is whole and complete.
The only direct means for confirming the perfection of nature is for each individual to
come into immediate contact with the reality of nature and see for himself. People must
experience this personally and choose to believe or not believe. I myself have found
nature to be perfect and am trying here only to present the evidence. Natural farming
begins with the assumption that nature is perfect.
Natural farming starts out with the conviction that barley seeds which fall to the earth
will send up sprouts without fail. If a barley sprout should emerge then later wilt in mid growth, something unnatural has occurred and one reflects on the cause, which originates
in human knowledge and action. One never blames nature, but begins by blaming
oneself. One searches unrelentingly for a way to grow barley in the heart of nature.
There is no good or evil in nature. Natural farming admits to the existence neither of
insect pests nor of beneficial insects. If a pest outbreak occurs, damaging the barley, one
reflects that this was probably triggered by some human mistake. Invariably, the cause
lies in some action by man; perhaps the barley was seeded too densely or a beneficial
fungus that attacks pests was killed, upsetting nature’s balance.
Thus, in natural farming, one always solves the problem by reflecting on the mistake
and returning as close to nature as possible. Those practicing scientific farming, on the
other hand, habitually blame insect infestation on the weather or some other aspect of
nature, then apply pesticides to exterminate the marauding pest and spray fungicides to
cure diseases.
The road diverges here, turning back to nature for those who believe nature to be
perfect, but leading on to the subjugation of nature for those who doubt its perfection.
Do Not Look at Things Relatively
In natural farming, one always avoids seeing things in relative terms; should one catch
sight of relative phenomena, one immediately tries to trace these back to a single source,
to reunite the two broken halves. To farm naturally, one must question and reject
scientific thinking, all of which is founded on a relative view of things: notions of good
and poor crop growth, fast and slow, life and death, health and disease, large and small
yields, major and minor gains, profits and losses.
Let me now describe what constitutes a viewpoint that does not fall prey to relativistic
perceptions so that I may help correct the errors committed by a relative view of things.
From a scientific perspective, things are large or small, dead or alive, increasing or
decreasing. But this view is predicated on notions of time and space, and is really nothing
more than a convenient assumption. In the natural world which transcends time and
space, there is, properly speaking, no large or small, no life or death, no rise or fall. Nor
was there ever the conflict and contradiction of opposing pairs: right and left, fast and
slow, strong and weak.
If we go beyond the confines of time and space, we see that the autumn wilting of a
rice plant can be understood as life passing into the seed and continuing on into eternity.
Only man frets over life and death, gain and loss. A method of farming founded on the
view of birth as the beginning and death as the end cannot help but be short-sighted.
In the narrow scientific view, growth appears to be either good or poor, and yields
either large or small, but the amount of sunlight reaching the earth stays constant and the
levels of oxygen and carbon dioxide remain balanced in the atmosphere. This being so,
why do we nevertheless see differences in growth and yields? The fault is usually man’s.
Man destroys the immutability and stability of nature either by himself invoking the
notions of large and small, many and few, or by altering form and substance. These
things become self-evident when viewed from a deeper and broader perspective or from a
perspective in accordance with nature.
Man generally finds value only in the harvest of grains and fruit. But nature sees both
cereal grains and weeds, and all the animals and microorganisms that inhabit the natural
world, as the fruit of the earth. Notions of quantity and size usually exist within a limited
frame of reference. From a broader or slightly more relaxed perspective, these cease to be
problems at all.
When looking at nature from the standpoint of natural farming, one does not worry
over minor circumstances; there is no need for concern over form, substance, size,
hardness, and other peripheral matters. Such concerns only cause us to lose sight of the
real essence of nature and shut off the road back to nature.
Take Perspective That Transcends Time and Space
I have said that to travel the road leading to a natural way of farming, one must reject
the use of discriminating knowledge and not take a relativistic view of the world. Such
rejection may be thought of as a means for attaining a perspective transcending time and
space. A world without discrimination, an absolute world that passes beyond the reaches
of the relative world, is a world that transcends space and time.
When captive to the notions of space and time, we are capable only of seeing things
circumstantially. Scientific farming is a method of farming that originates within the
confines of time and space, but Mahayana natural farming comes into being only in a
world beyond time and space.
Thus, in striving to realize a natural way of farming, one must focus one’s efforts on
overcoming time and space constraints in everything one does. Transcending time and
space is both the starting point and the destination of natural farming. Scientific farming,
concerned as it is with harvesting so much from a given field over such-and-such a period
of time, is confined within the limits of time and space. But in natural farming one must
go beyond space and time by making decisions and achieving results supported by a
position of freedom and a long-term and general perspective.
To give an example, when an insect alights on a rice plant, science immediately zeros
in on the relationship between the rice plant and the insect. If the insect feeds on juices
from the leaves of the plant and the plant dies, then the insect is viewed as a pest. The
pest is researched: it is identified taxonomically,and its morphology and ecology studied
carefully. This knowledge is eventually used to determine how to kill it.
The first thing that the natural farmer does when he sees this crop and the insect is to
see, yet not see, the rice; to see and yet not see the insect. He is not misled by
circumstantial matters; he does not pursue the scientific method of inquiry by observing
the rice and insect or investigating what the insect is. He does not ask why, when, and
from where it came, or try to find out what it is doing in his field. What then does he do?
He reaches beyond time and space by taking the stance that there are no crops or pests in
nature to begin with. The concepts of “raising plants” and “harmful insects” are just
words coined by man based on subjective criteria grounded in the self; viewed in terms of
the natural order, they are meaningless. This insect is thus a pest and yet not a pest.
Which is to say that its presence in no way interferes with growth of the rice plant for
there is a way of farming in which both the rice plant and the insect can coexist in
harmony.
Natural farming seeks to develop methods of rice cultivation in which the existence of
“pests” poses no problem. It begins by first stating the conclusion and clearing up local
and temporal problems in a way that fits the conclusion. Even leaf hoppers, pests from the
scientific viewpoint, do not always harm rice. The time and circumstances also play a
part.
When I say that it is necessary to examine things from a broad, long-range
perspective, I do not mean that one must conduct difficult and highly specialized
research. The scientist studies rice damage by a particular insect, but it would suffice to
observe cases where the insect does no damage to the rice. Such cases invariably exist.
Instances of damage are quite naturally accompanied also by instances of no damage.
There may be immense damage in one field and none in another. Invariably too, there are
cases in which the insects will not even approach the rice. Natural farming examines
cases in which little or no damage occurs and the reasons why, based on which it creates
circumstances where nothing is done, yet insect damage is nonexistent.
One type of leaf hopper that attacks rice plants early in the growing season is the green
rice leaf hopper, which lives among the weeds in the levees between rice fields from
winter to early spring. To rid the fields of these leaf hoppers, burning the levee weeds is
preferable to direct application of a leaf hopper poison. But an even better way is to
change the variety of weeds growing on the levees.
The white-backed leaf hopper and the brown leaf hopper tend to appear during long
spells of hot, humid weather, but break out in especially large numbers in the summer or
fall in flooded fields of stagnant water. When the field is drained and the surface exposed
to breezes so that it dries, spiders and frogs emerge in number, helping reduce damage to
a minimum.
The farmer need not worry about damage by leaf hoppers if he cultivates healthy fields
of rice. Nature is always showing man, somewhere and sometime, situations in which
pests are not pests and do not cause real damage. Instead of holing up in laboratories,
people can learn directly in the open classrooms of nature.
Natural farming takes its departure from a perspective transcending time and space,
and returns to a point beyond time and space. Man must learn from nature the bridge that
links these two points. The real meaning of taking a transcendent perspective, in plain,
down-to-earth terms, is to help provide both insect pests and beneficial insects with a
pleasant environment in which to live.
Do Not Be Led Astray by Circumstance
To look at things from a perspective that transcends time and place is to prevent
oneself from becoming captive to circumstance. Even science constantly tries to avoid
becoming too wrapped up in details and losing sight of the larger picture. However, this
“larger picture” is not the true picture. There is another view that is broader and more all encompassing.
In nature, a whole encloses the parts, and a yet larger whole encloses the whole
enclosing the parts. By enlarging our field of view, what is thought of as a whole
becomes, in fact, nothing more than one part of a larger whole. Yet another whole
encloses this whole in a concentric series that continues on to infinity. Therefore, while it
can be said that to act one must intuitively grasp the true “whole” and include therein all
small particulars, this cannot actually be done.
Let us take an example from the world of medicine. The physician studies the stomach
and intestines, examines the ingredients of various foods, and investigates how these are
absorbed as nutrients by the human body. The common perception is that, as research
becomes increasingly focused and parallel advances are made in broad interdisciplinary
studies, nutritional science becomes an authoritative field in its own right with wide
application.
But for all we know, nutritional science, which was introduced to Japan from Western
Europe, may have first been modeled on German beer drinkers or French wine lovers.
Nutritional principles that work for them do not necessarily apply to the people of Africa,
for example. The same radishes will be absorbed very differently and will have an
entirely different nutritive value for the irritable city dweller afflicted by smog and noise
pollution who eats his without secreting digestive juices, as compared with the tropical
African who munches on his after a meal of wild game.
Progress in medicine has brought us a whole host of dietary therapies, such as low calorie diets for people who want to lose weight, light diets for people with stomach
problems, low-salt diets for people with bad kidneys, and sugarless diets for people with
pancreatic ailments. But what happens when a person has problems with two or three
organs? If this food is out and that one forbidden, then the poor fellow, unable to eat
anything, could end up as thin as a dried sardine.
It is a mistake to believe that as advances are made in a broad range of highly
specialized fields, the scope of applications grows. We should not forget that the more
highly specialized the research, the further it strays from a broad overall perspective.
In an age before the development of nutritional science, before we gave any thought
about what was good or bad for us, alt we knew was that to stay healthy, one should eat
in moderation. Which has broader application? Which is more effective? Modern
nutritional science with its specialized research or traditional admonitions for moderation
at mealtime? Modern nutritional science may appear to have broader application because
it considers all cases. Yet it forbids first one thing then another, so people keep running
into walls and struggling with a lot of new problems. Cruder but complete, the simple
knowledge that one should cut with moderation applies to all people and thus it works
better. This is so because knowledge that is less discriminating has wider application.
Be Free of Cravings and Desires
The aim of scientific farming is to chase after the objects of man’s desire, but natural
farming does not seek to satisfy or promote human cravings. Its mission is to provide the
bread of human life. This is all it seeks, no more.It knows how much is enough. There is
no need to become caught up in man’s cravings and attempts to expand and fortify
production.
What has the campaign in Japan to produce good-tasting rice over the last several
years achieved? How much happier does it make us when a farmer throws himself into
improving varieties and raising production in response to the vagaries of the consumer
for “tasty” rice and barley. Only the farmer suffers, because nature strongly resists all his
efforts to upgrade crops for minor gains in taste and sweetness. Do urbanites know the
torments that farmers go through—declines in production, reduced crop resistance to
diseases and pests, to give but a couple examples—when consumers demand the slightest
improvement in flavor?
Nature sounds warnings and resists man’s unnatural demands. Only, it says nothing.
Man must make reparations for his own sins. But he cannot forget the sweetness he has
tasted. Once the cravings of the palate assert themselves, there is no retreating. No matter
how great the labors that farmers must shoulder as a result, these are of no concern to the
consumer. Scientific farming exalts and follows the example of the farmer working
diligently to service the endlessly growing demands of city dwellers, who expect, as a
matter of course, fresh fruit and beautiful flowers in all seasons.
The fruits of autumn picked in the fields and mountains were beautiful and sweet. The
beauty of flowers in a meadow was a thing to behold. Natural farming tries to enter the
bosom of nature, not break it down from without. It has no interest in conquering nature,
but seeks instead to obey it. It serves not man’s ambitions, but nature, reaping its fruit and
wine. To the selfless, nature is always beautiful and sweet, always constant. Because all
is fundamentally one.
No Plan Is the Best Plan
If nature is perfect, then man should have no need to do anything. But nature, to man,
appears imperfect and riddled with contradiction. Left to themselves, crops become
diseased, they are infested by insects, they lodge and wither.
But upon taking a good look at these examples of imperfection, we realize that they
occur when nature has been thwarted, when man has fiddled with nature. If nature is left
in an unnatural state, this inevitably invites failure, leading not only to imperfection, but
even catastrophe.
When nature appears imperfect this is the result of something man has done to nature
that has never been rectified. When left to its proper cycles and workings, nature does not
fail. Nature may act,, or may compensate or offset one thing for another, but it always
does so while maintaining order and moderation.
The pine tree that grows on a mountain rises up straight and true, sending out branches
in all directions in a regular annular pattern. In keeping with the rule of phyllotaxy, the
branches remain equally spaced as they grow, so no matter how many years pass,
branches never crisscross or overlap and die. The tree grows in just the right way to allow
all the branches and leaves to receive equal amounts of sunlight.
But when a pine is transplanted into a garden and pruned with clippers, the
arrangement of branches undergoes a dramatic change, taking on the contorted
“elegance” of a garden tree. This is because, once it has been pruned, the pine no longer
sends out normal shoots and branches. Instead, branches grow irregularly, crisscrossing
every which way, bending, twisting, and overlapping with each other. By merely nipping
the buds at the tips of a few shoots, conical citrus trees that had until then grown straight
fork into a three-leader arrangement or assume a wineglass shape. The same is true of all
trees.
Once man comes into the act, a tree loses its natural form. In a tree of unnatural habit,
the branches are in disarray, growing either too close together or too far apart. Diseases
arise and insects burrow and nest wherever there is poor ventilation or inadequate
exposure to sunlight. And where two branches cross,a struggle for survival ensues; one
will thrive, the other die. All it takes to destroy the conditions of nature and transform a
tree that lived in peace and harmony into a battleground where the strong consume the
weak is to nip a few young buds.
Although disruption of the order and balance of nature may have begun as the
unintentional consequence of impulsive human deeds,this has grown and escalated to the
point where there is no turning back. Once tampered with, the garden pine can never
revert back again to being a natural -tree. All it takes to disturb the natural habit of a fruit
tree is to nip a single bud at the end of a young shoot.
When nature has been tainted and left unnatural, what remains? It is here that begins
the never-ending toil of man. Two crisscrossing branches compete with each other. To
prevent this, man must meticulously prune the garden pine each year.
Snipping off the tip of a branch causes several irregular branches to grow in its place.
The tips of these new branches must then be cut the next year The following year, the
even larger number of new branches create even greater confusion, increasing the amount
of pruning that has to be done.
The same holds true for the pruning of fruit trees.A fruit tree pruned once must be
tended for its entire life. The tree is no longer able to space its branches properly and
grow in the direction it chooses. It leaves the decision up to the farmer and just sends out
branches wherever and however it pleases without the least regard for order or regularity.
Now it is man’s turn to think and cut the branches not needed. Nor can he overlook those
places where the branches cross or grow too densely together. If he does, the tree will
grow confused; branches at the center will rot and wither, and the tree will become
susceptible to disease and insects and eventually die.
Man, therefore, is compelled to act-because he earlier created the very conditions that
now require his action. Because he has made nature unnatural, he must compensate for
and correct the defects arising from this unnatural state.
Similarly, man’s deeds have made farming technology essential. Plowing, transplanting, tillage, weeding, and disease and pest control—all these practices are necessary
today because man has tampered with and altered nature. The reason a farmer has to plow
his rice field is that he plowed it the year before, then flooded and harrowed it, breaking
the clods of earth into smaller and smaller particles, driving the air out and compacting
the soil. Because he kneads the earth like bread dough, the field has to be plowed each
year. Naturally, under such conditions, plowing the field raises productivity.
Man also makes crop disease and pest control indispensable by growing unhealthy
crops. Agricultural technology creates the causes that produce disease and pest damage,
then becomes adept at treating these. Growing healthy crops should take precedence.
Scientific farming attempts to correct and improve on what it perceives as the
shortcomings of nature through human effort. In contrast, when a problem arises, natural
farming relentlessly pursues the causes and strives to correct and restrain human action.
The best plan, then, is true non-action; it is no plan at all.
3. Natural Farming for a New Age
At the Vanguard of Modern Farming
To some, natural farming may appear as a return to a passive, primitive form of
farming over the road of idleness and inaction. Yet because it occupies an immutable and
unshakable position that transcends time and space,natural farming is always both the
oldest and the newest form of farming. Today, it presses on at the very leading edge of
modern agriculture.
Although the truth remains fixed and immobile, the heart of man is ever fickle and
changing; his thinking shifts with the passage of time, with circumstances, and so he is
forced to alter his means. He, and science with him, orbits forever about the periphery
without reaching in to the truth at the center.
Scientific farming blindly traces spiraling cycles in the tracks of science. Today’s new
technology will become the dated technology of tomorrow, and tomorrow’s reforms will
become the stale news of a later day. What is on the right today will appear on the left
tomorrow and on the right the day after. While this wheel spins round and round, it
expands and diffuses outward.
Even so, things were better when man circled about the periphery while gazing from
afar upon the truth at the center. Man today tries to leap outside of nature and truth
altogether. Balanced against this centrifugal force are the centripetal forces, represented
by efforts to return to nature and to see the truth that have managed only barely to
maintain a balance. But the moment this thread connected to the core breaks, man will fly
away from truth like a whirling stone. The danger has now arrived at the doorstep of
science. Scientific farming has no future.
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