 BIODYNAMICS or Fill Those Cow Horns by Roger Rawlings Afterword by Dan Dugan Many of Rudolf Steiner's doctrines are destructive: his racism, his medical quackery, and his advocacy of the warped forms of “thought” promoted at Waldorf schools. Some of his other doctrines, by contrast, do not rise to this level of perniciousness. They are, by and large, merely silly. Consider “biodynamic agriculture,” for example. I should start by saying that my wife and I grow and buy organic foods. We figure the fewer pesticides we ingest, the better. Biodynamic agriculture is Steiner's version of organic farming, and as such it may well be preferable to factory farming with its profligate use of dangerous chemicals. Still, Steiner's agricultural precepts are fully as mystical and unscientific as any of his other teachings. To practice biodynamic agriculture, one needs to resort to magic and astrology. (I almost feel that I could end this essay right here. Q.E.D. But I won't be that precipitous. I'll back up my assertions with examples and analyses.)  Steiner taught that a “healthy farm” is one that receives sufficient manure, in the correct proportions, from the animals living on that farm. [2] Thus, it would be unnecessary — indeed, “unhealthy” — to introduce fertilizers from outside sources. On the other hand, Steiner taught that farmers should take special steps in utilizing their homegrown fertilizing materials. Take one example. He specified that manure should be stuffed into cow horns, buried in the ground to a specified depth during the autumn, and disinterred during the following year. The decayed contents of the horns should then be diluted with water and spread on farm fields. [3] The dilution process, which is intended to release the latent energies within the decayed matter, seems more suitable to a sorcerer's laboratory than to a present-day farm. The following description is from a biodynamic Web site in England: “Horn Manure is cow manure that has been fermented in the soil over winter inside a cow horn ... Before being applied very small amounts ... are dissolved in water and stirred rigorously for one whole hour. This is done by stirring (preferably by hand) in one direction in such a way that a deep crater is formed in the stirring vessel (bucket, barrel). Then the direction is changed, the water seethes and slowly a new crater is formed. Each time a well-formed crater is achieved the direction is changed until the full hour is completed. In this way the dynamic effects concentrated in the prepared manure ... are released into the rhythmically moved water and become effective for soil and plant.” [4] Why must the manure decay inside cow horns? The same Web site offers this explanation: “Soil [is] created through an active interweaving of mineral, plant and animal processes ... It is then perhaps not quite so surprising that several [biodynamic] preparations require something from the animal world, in order to make them fully effective.” [5]  Steiner was the author of much of the pseudo science that is used to justify biodynamics. But to really understand his thinking, we need to go deeper — or, if you will, higher. Steiner's agricultural doctrines — like his doctrines on all other subjects — are essentially spiritualistic. The physical universe, in his system, is entirely immersed in, and influenced by, spiritual realities. To grasp any of Steiner's statements, we need to constantly remember that he traces all physical effects back to spiritual causes. Here is a statement Steiner made about a simple vegetable, the beetroot: “There, for example, is the beetroot growing in the earth. To take it just for what it is within its narrow limits, is nonsense if in reality its growth depends on countless conditions, not even only of the Earth as a whole, but of the cosmic environment.” [6] If in referring to factors that do not originate on Earth, Steiner meant sunlight, then it would be true that beetroots depend on both earthly and cosmic influences. But that's not what he meant. Notice that he referred to “countess conditions ... of the cosmic environment” [emphasis added]. He was alluding to the influences of the Sun, Moon, planets, and stars (which, remember, are themselves manifestations of spiritual powers), and also to the influences of purely spiritual beings. We would not be far off the mark if we referred to Steiner's agricultural doctrines as irremediably astrological. The best times for preparing fields, sowing crops, etc., depend — according to Steiner — on the timing of eclipses and the passages of the Moon between the Earth and various planets, etc. The biodynamic Web site biodynamics.com lists presumably important cosmic events. Here's a brief sample: “The times indicated are those the author deems to be the first choice periods for working the soil, applying biodynamic preparations, sowing seed, or working with plants in general.
• January 22 – Moon occults Uranus @ 0:29 pm • February 2 – Moon occults Saturn @ 6:34 pm • March 1 – Moon occults Saturn @ 9:12 pm • March 3 – Lunar Eclipse @ 6:17 pm • March 16 – Moon occults Mercury @ 11:56 pm • March 18 – Solar Eclipse @ 10:43 pm” [7] Steiner was quite specific (although, as always, pseudoscientific) in his description of the influence planets have on plants:  “Everything that lives in the silicious [sic] nature contains forces which comes [sic] not from the Earth but from the so-called distant planets, the planets beyond the Sun — Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. That which proceeds from these distant planets influences the life of plants via [silicon and related substances]. On the other hand, from all that is represented in the planets near the Earth — Moon, Mercury and Venus — forces work through limestone and kindred substances.” [8] Few astronomers (if any) would classify the Moon as a planet. And most would wonder at the absence of Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto, from Steiner’s discussion of the solar system. But let that go. According to Steiner, cosmic forces also affect a farm's animal population: “The animal organism lives in the whole complex of Nature’s household. In form and colour and configuration, and in the structure and consistency of its substance from the front to the hinder parts, it is related to these influences. From the snout towards the heart, the Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars influences are at work; in the heart itself the Sun, and towards the tail, the Venus, Mercury, and Moon influences.” [9] The upshot of Steiner’s dogmas is that biodynamic growers spend a lot of time studying planetary movements. This study is complicated, somewhat, by Steiner's insistence that the planets don't actually orbit the sun. Instead, they are lined up with it — some ahead, some behind — and travel along with the sun as it weaves its way through the cosmos. [10] Steiner taught that cosmic (in effect, astrological) considerations affect every part of a farm, not only the soil, plant life, and animal life, but also the water supply. Steiner states his case in these words: “Water, in effect, is eminently suited to prepare the ways within the earthly domain for those forces which come, for instance, from the Moon. Water brings about the distribution of the lunar forces in the earthly realm ... Let us therefore suppose that there have just been rainy days and that these are followed by a full Moon. In deed [sic] and in truth, with the forces that come from the Moon on days of the full Moon, something colossal is taking place on the Earth. These forces spring up and shoot into all the growth of plants, but they are unable to do so unless rainy days have gone before ... Is it not of some significance, whether we sow the seed in a certain relation to the rainfall and the subsequent light of the full Moon, or whether we sow it thoughtlessly at any time? Something, no doubt, will come up even then ... [I]n certain plants, what the full Moon has to do will thrive intensely after rainy days and will take place but feebly and sparingly after days of sunshine.” [11]  If we leave out the unsupported assertions, the equivocations, and the lunar nonsense, what does this statement amount to? Seeds sprout better in moist soil than in dry. Numerous organic growers employ biodynamic methods, and it seems possible that they may achieve results comparable to those reached by conventional organic growers. Until we find sensible ways to define and measure such misty concepts as “the influences of Venus, Mercury and Moon,” there can be no way to make a rational, scientific evaluation. A farmer who decides to plant peas when the Moon occults Venus, or to create magical field preparations by stuffing manure into cow horns, is not hurting anyone. But s/he is probably wasting a lot of time. This is, after all, the twenty-first century. Haven't we learned anything? According to Steiner, the parts of a plant correspond inversely to our parts: The blossom or fruit is the lower body; the stem and leaves are the chest; the roots are the head. This is my colored rendering of the b&w image on p. 83 of Rudolf Steiner, FROM SUNSPOTS TO STRAWBERRIES (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2002.) [R.R., 2009.]  Detail from a drawing by a Waldorf student.  The stars and the inner Earth, Steinerwise. Detail from a drawing by a Waldorf student. Farm animals, drawn by a Waldorf student. [vk wade.] This image and the one below were not created with biodynamics specifically in mind, as far as I know. I use them because they evoke — at least for one old Waldorf graduate — moods often found in and around Waldorf schools. [Petr Kratochvil.] POSTCRIPT Biodynamic farms are not places of utter sweetness and light, tinged just a bit by superstition and foolishness. Biodynamic agriculture requires the use of animal body parts, including horns, skulls, intestines, and mesentery. To harvest these parts, farmers slaughter animals. Some critics of Steiner’s teachings accuse biodynamic farmers of sacrificing animals for this purpose, and it is possible that some farmers may do this. That is, they may kill the animals for the exclusive or primary purpose of getting the bits they want for biodynamic voodoo. However, it appears that biodynamic farmers more commonly slaughter their animals the same way most other farmers do — they kill the animals for meat. Then the biodynamic farmers take the extra step of saving the “magical” body parts. [12] Most people eat meat and, therefore, they may have no objection to the way animals are treated on biodynamic farms. But strict vegetarians and animals’ rights advocates should take note: The foods produced at biodynamic farms result from practices that are bound up with the killing of animals and the use of animal body parts for food production. If this appalls you, you should buy your groceries from other providers. Parents of Waldorf students may also want to mull over this subject. If a Waldorf school maintains a biodynamic garden (at many schools, the children will work in these gardens), the slaughtering of animals lurks in the garden's background.
— Roger Rawlings Painting by a Waldorf student [courtesy of PLANS]. AFTERWORD by Dan Dugan On December 2, 2008, Dan Dugan posted the following message at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/waldorf-critics/ . I have reprinted it here by permission. — Roger Rawlings A recent fund-raising mailing from the Fellowship Community in Chestnut Ridge, NY (an Anthroposophical elder care facility) included a celebration of the life of Ehrenfried Pfeiffer, one of the founders of biodynamic agriculture. It reads (in part): “In 1899, on the last day of the ‘dark Age’, [sic] a boy was born in southern Germany; he died in 1961 at the Threefold Community. [13] He was a very sensitive child and youth. He had an exceptionally close relationship with the life of nature. He grew up to become involved in WWI and was later guided through university training by Rudolf Steiner. His curriculum was daunting with an emphasis on chemistry in nature and in the human being. His purpose in life became the performance of the necessary research work to make evident the life forces working in nature and in the human being. He was one of the first adventurers to advocate and experiment with birthing Bio-Dynamics. In the late 1930's, he received an honorary medical doctorate from Hahneman Medical College for his work with the crystallographic revelation of the formative forces at work in the earth, in minerals, plants, animals, and in the cosmos. The Organic Movement in this country was born at his doorstep....” The “dark age” referred to is the Kali Yuga of Anthroposophical myth. [14] In my estimation, rather than having ended, a dark age is developing now with a worldwide shift from scientific to magical thinking. The “necessary research work to make evident the life forces” points up the antique scientific method that Steiner taught and Anthroposophists follow. Nineteenth-century scientists worked to “prove” their hypotheses by finding evidence that tended to support them. Twentieth-century science (especially since Karl Popper) learned that such a method is unreliable — it is better to challenge hypotheses as rigorously as possible. Pfeiffer's “sensitive crystallization” procedure is the main biological and chemical analysis technique used in biodynamics and Anthroposophical medicine. Reading the highly random patterns formed during crystallization of a salt in solution with the substance being tested (blood, for example) is like reading tea leaves. Random data is an essential input for quack scientific methods — you can see anything you want in it. Pfeiffer was an effusive hagiographer of Steiner, and he is now celebrated as one of the master's successors. For statements Steiner made about magic and witchcraft, please use this link: "Magic". For some of Steiner's own words in agriculture, please see "Superstition". ◊◊◊◊ ENDNOTES [1] “[T]he areas in which he grew up were little changed from the Middle Ages ... he found himself in the mountains, among peasants whose way of life stretched unchanged into past centuries ... The peasants still maintained somewhat a clairvoyant perception of nature, and their cultural life was intimately related to the changing of the seasons and the tasks linked to what Steiner later called 'the breathing of the earth.'” [Hilmar Moore, “Rudolf Steiner: A Biographical Introduction for Farmers,” BIODYNAMICS #214, November/December 1997.] [2] “The farm is only healthy inasmuch as it provides its own manure from it own stock.” Rudolf Steiner, AGRICULTURE COURSE (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2004), p. 40. [3] “Biodynamic agriculture,” WIKIPEDIA, 2/12/2007. One must be cautious about citing WIKIPEDIA, but in this instance the entry seems reliable. See the next quotation in this essay, which generally confirms the entry. (I would offer an entry from the Encyclopedia Britannica, but there is none, an omission that indicates the standing of biodynamic agriculture in the eyes of independent experts.) [4] “Biodynamic Frequently Asked Questions,” www.biodynamic.org.uk . [5] “Why Are Animal Organs Used?”, www.biodynamic.org.uk . [6] Rudolf Steiner, AGRICULTURE COURSE, p.20. [7] Hugh J. Courtney, “Recommendations for Working with Crops, Sequential Spraying, and Ashing (for U.S.A.), January through June, 2007, (EST until April 1 at 2:00 am, then EDT),” biodynamics.com . [8] Rudolf Steiner, AGRICULTURE COURSE, p.24. [9] Ibid., p.40. [10] Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), pp. 30-31. [11] Rudolf Steiner, AGRICULTURE COURSE, p.26. [12] E.g., a defender of biodynamic practices has written, “There are many small farms that have cattle for meat and dairy. When the farmer decides to slaughter (notice we farmers don't use the word sacrifice) a cow, the animal goes to the local butcher to get processed and put in the freezer. On biodynamic farms, the farmer will keep the intestine, mesentery, skull and horns. To use for compost preparations. These are parts that are normally thrown away.” [http://tastingroom.pressdemocrat.com/default.asp?item=2365133 ] [13] Threefolding was Steiner’s attempt to formulate a new social order, especially for Germany following World War I. The term refers to three spheres of social life: politics, economics, and culture. Steiner drew up his proposals in opposition to the Fourteen Points offered by U.S. President Woodrow Wilson for ending of the war. Wilson’s points included arms reductions, the adjustment of colonial aims, and the drawing of national boundaries to correspond with the ethnicity of populations. Steiner considered Wilson’s proposals — and the entire set of terms discussed by the Allies for the treatment of defeated Germany — too harsh. [See, e.g., Rudolf Steiner, THE THREE-FOLD COMMONWEALTH (Macmillan, 1922).] The threefolding movement had little effect, and Steiner soon redirected his attention to mysticism. Several Anthroposophical groups and institutions are clustered in rural New York. “The residents and institutions of the Threefold community have been promoting spiritual values in the arts, education and community life since 1926.” See http://www.threefold.org/ . “The Fellowship Community, founded in 1966, is a community of all ages, centered around the care of the elderly.” See http://www.fellowshipcommunity.org/ . The Pfeiffer Center (named for Ehrenfried Pfeiffer) “is dedicated to education, research and outreach in farming, gardening and beekeeping. An important goal is to raise awareness of biodynamics as the most holistic approach to caring for the land.” See http://www.pfeiffercenter.org/ . [14] “Kali Yuga began in the year 3101 prior to the founding of Christianity ... In the period prior to the year 3101 B.C. ... there existed that which one can designate at the last residue of the old clairvoyance ... In the course of human evolution these periods follow each other: Krita Yuga — Treta Yuga — Dvapara Yuga — Kali Yuga.” [Rudolf Steiner, COMPILED LECTURES (Anthroposophic Press, 1944 — reprinted by Health Research, 2006), p. 37.] Krita Yuga, which came before the destruction of Atlantis, was the Golden Age when humans were still consciously united with “Divine-Spiritual beings.” [Ibid., p. 5] Treta Yuga was the Silver Age when men were less conscious of the gods but retained a memory of them and had a vague awareness of spiritual realities in general, an awareness that became heightened during sleep. [p. 6] During Dvapara Theta, the Bronze Age, men became more adjusted to physical reality and thus retained little spiritual insight — they could remember the spirit realm only as old men can remember their youth. [p. 6] During Kali Yuga, the Dark Age, “the doors of the spiritual world were closed.” [p. 6] As he often did, Steiner fudged the meanings of the terms he used — Krita Yuga, thus, may be considered to extend a fairly brief period or an extremely long period into the past. [pp. 6-7] Kali Yuga, if considered “in the sense in which we first used the term,” [p. 7] began more than three millennia before the birth of Christ and ended in 1899 A.D. [p. 9] During the era following Kali Yuga, men will gain new clairvoyant powers. [p. 9] Steiner offered himself as an adept in such powers. The rest of us can gradually catch up with him: The present, post-Kali age will last for 2500 years. [p. 10] ◊◊◊◊ Because Web postings are subject to change, I should state that I visited most of the sites mentioned above during the first half of February, 2007. As of early October, 2008, the sites were still online, but the contents of some pages may have changed. Poking around on the Web to keep abreast of these subjects can be interesting. Here is something I found on Feb. 3, 2009; it was written by a grape grower who rejects biodynamics: “I want to address Steiner’s irrational thought: Rodent control by burning rodent skins and spreading the ashes in our fields? Do I really accept that the horns of animals act like antennas and concentrate cosmic forces into the compounds places in them? ... Why bury items just so deep? ... Just how does astronomy affect these buried things and why am I supposed to bury them in the first place? ... I don’t believe I should accept as infallible a mystic who rejected experimentation in favor of clairvoyance. I ask myself, ‘Why would that work?’” [John Hilliard, “Why I Do Not Farm Biodynamically,” DAILY WINE NEWS, 1/16/2009.] This prompted a curious rebuttal: “Steiner was indeed a nut, but he didn't dream all this stuff up. He was a reluctant evangelist who condensed whole epochs of old wives’ gardening tales and had the guts to promote them.” [Philip White, “Fertile Ground for True Believers,” THE INDEPENDENT WEEKLY, 2/3/2009.] With defenders like that... — Roger Rawlings  [R.R., 2009]  [R.R., 2009] |