I re-read two of his books and was awed again, more than ten years ago :
One-Straw Revolution :
https://wikischool.org/book/the_one-straw_revolution
Natural Way of Farming :
https://wikischool.org/book/natural_way_of_farming
PDFs here :
https://wikischool.org/nature_farming
Early bonus, he beautifully paraphrases Grinus's signature :
"If we strip away the layers of human knowledge and action from nature one by one, true nature will emerge of itself."
"To achieve a humanity and a society founded on non-action, man must look back over everything he has done and rid himself one by one of the false visions and concepts that permeate him and his society. This is what the “do-nothing” movement is all about."
The impact of the philosophy hit differently this time, so I'll do my best to present it in different aspects.
All of below are direct quotes from the books.
The way he describes his illumination / understanding / awakening :
One night as I wandered, I collapsed in exhaustion on a hill overlooking the harbor, finally dozing against the trunk of a large tree. I lay there, neither asleep nor awake, until dawn. I can still remember that it was the morning of the 15th of May. In a daze I watched the harbor grow light, seeing the sunrise and yet somehow not seeing it. As the breeze blew up from below the bluff, the morning mist suddenly disappeared. Just at that moment a night heron appeared, gave a sharp cry, and flew away into the distance. I could hear the flapping of its wings. In an instant all my doubts and the gloomy mist of my confusion vanished. Everything I had held in firm conviction, everything upon which I had ordinarily relied was swept away with the wind. I felt that I understood just one thing.
Without my thinking about them, words came from my mouth: “In this world there is nothing at all. . . .”I felt that I understood nothing.*
*To “understand nothing,” in this sense, is to recognize the insufficiency of intellectual knowledge.
I could see that all the concepts to which I had been clinging, the very notion of existence itself, were empty fabrications. My spirit became light and clear. I was dancing wildly for joy. I could hear the small birds chirping in the trees, and see the distant waves glistening in the rising sun. The leaves danced green and sparkling. I felt that this was truly heaven on earth. Everything that had possessed me, all the agonies, disappeared like dreams and illusions, and something one might call “true nature” stood revealed.
I think it could safely be said that from the experience of that morning my life changed completely.
Comparisons of Farming methods :
Although I have already shown in some detail the differences between natural farming and scientific farming, I would like to return here to compare the principles on which each is based. For the sake of convenience, I shall divide natural farming into two types and consider each separately.
**Mahayana Natural Farming:** When the human spirit and human life blend with the natural order and man devotes himself entirely to the service of nature, he lives freely as an integral part of the natural world, subsisting on its bounty without having to resort to purposeful effort. This type of farming, which I shall call Mahayana natural farming, is realized when man becomes one with nature, for it is a way of farming that transcends time and space and reaches the zenith of understanding and enlightenment.
This relationship between man and nature is like an ideal marriage in which the partners together realize a perfect life without asking for, giving, or receiving anything of each other. Mahayana farming is the very embodiment of life in accordance with nature.
Those who live such a life are hermits and wise men.
**Hinayana Natural Farming:** This type of farming arises when man earnestly seeks entry to the realm of Mahayana farming. Desirous of the true blessings and bounty of nature, he prepares himself to receive it. This is the road leading directly to complete enlightenment, but is short of that perfect state. The relationship between man and nature here is like that of a lover who yearns after his loved one and asks for her hand, but has not realized full union.
**Scientific Farming:** Man exists in a state of contradiction in which he is basically estranged from nature, living in a totally artificial world, yet longs for a return to nature.
A product of this condition, scientific farming forever wanders blindly back and forth, now calling upon the blessings of nature, now rejecting it in favor of human knowledge and action. Returning to the same analogy, our lover here is unable to decide whose hand to ask in marriage, and, while agonizing over his indecision, imprudently courts the ladies, heedless of social proprieties.
- Absolute World: Mahayana natural farming (philosopher’s way of farming) = pure natural farming
- Relative World: Hinayana natural farming (idealistic farming) = natural farming, organic farming
- Scientific farming (dialectical materialism) = scientific agriculture
God and man are travelers passing in opposite directions. Likewise for natural farming and scientific farming. These two paths start from the opposite sides of nature. One seeks to approach closer to nature, the other to move farther away.
Comparisons of thinking process / climbing analogy :
Nature on the exterior shows only facts, but says nothing. However these facts are stark and clear. There is no need for explanation. To those who fail to acknowledge these facts, I mutter in my heart: “The farmer is not concerned about high-yield theories and interpretations. What counts is that the yields are the highest possible and the methods used the best there are. This in itself is enough. Certainly you are not telling a farmer to furnish by himself the proof with which to convince physicists, chemists, biologists, and specialists in all the other disciplines. And if I had gone to all that trouble, this barley you see here would never have been grown. I don’t have the time to do research just for research’s sake. And to begin with, I don’t accept the need to spend one’s entire life engaged in such activity.”
Natural farming thus begins by formulating conclusions, then seeks concrete means of attaining these. This contrasts sharply with the inductive approach, whereby one studies the situation as it stands and from this derives a theory with which one searches for a conclusion while making gradual improvements along the way. In the first case, we have a conclusion, but no means of achieving it, and in the second, we have means at our disposal, but no conclusion.
As an example, natural farming uses intuitive reasoning to draw up an ideal vision of rice cultivation, infers the environmental conditions under which a situation approximating the ideal can arise, and work out a means of achieving this ideal.
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Induction and deduction can be likened to two climbers ascending a rock face. The lower of the two, who checks his footing before giving the climber in the lead a boost, plays an inductive role, while the lead climber, who lets down a rope and pulls the lower climber up, plays a deductive role.
Induction and deduction are complementary and together form a whole. Surprising as it may seem, although scientific agriculture has relied primarily on inductive experimentation, progress has been made as well in deductive reasoning. This is why measures to prevent crop losses and measures to boost yields have been confused.
Deduction here being merely a concept defined in relation to induction, we may see a gradual increase in yields, but are unlikely to see a dramatic improvement. Our two climbers make only slow progress and will never go beyond the peak they have already sighted.
To attain dramatically improved yields of a type possible only by a fundamental revolution in farming practices, one would have to rely not on this restricted notion of deduction, but on a broader deductive method; namely, intuitive reasoning. In addition to our two climbers with a rope, other radically different methods of reaching the top of the mountain are possible, such as descending onto the peak by rope from a helicopter. It is from just such intuitive reasoning, which goes beyond induction and deduction that the thinking underlying natural farming arises.
The creative roots of natural farming lie in true intuitive understanding. The point of departure must be a true grasp of nature gained by fixing one’s gaze on the natural world that extends beyond actions and events in one’s immediate surroundings. An infinitude of yield-improving possibilities lie hidden here. One must look beyond the immediate.
Human intellect is imperfect / Nature is perfect :
Nature is entirely self-contained. In its eternal cycles of change, never is there the slightest extravagance or waste. All the products of the human intellect—which has strayed far from the bosom of nature—and ail man’s labors are doomed to end in vain.
The paths of nature and of science and human action are forever parallel and never cross. Moreover, because they proceed in opposite directions, the distance between nature and science grows ever larger. As it moves along its path, science appears to maintain a cooperative association and harmony with nature, but in reality it aspires to dissect and analyze nature to know it completely in and out. Having done so, it will discard the pieces and move on without looking back. It hungers for struggle and conquest.
Nature is an absolute void. Those who see nature as a point have gone one step astray, those who see it as a circle have gone two steps astray, and those who see breadth, matter, time, and cycles have wandered off into a world of illusion distant and divorced from true nature.
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.
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.
Man has always deluded himself into thinking that he knows nature and is free to use it as he wishes to build his civilizations. But nature cannot be explained or expanded upon. As an organic whole, it not subject to man’s classifications; nor does it tolerate dissection and analysis. Once broken down, nature cannot be returned to its original state.
All that remains is an empty skeleton devoid of the true essence of living nature. This skeletal image only serves to confuse man and lead him further astray.
In his desire to know and understand nature, man applies numerous laws to it from many different perspectives. As would be expected, human knowledge deepens and expands, but man is sadly deceived in thinking that he draws closer to a true understanding of nature as he learns more about it. For he actually draws further and further away from nature with each new discovery and each fresh bit of knowledge.
The dreams of scientists are just mirages, nothing more than wild dancing in the hand of the Lord Buddha. Even if scientists change the living and nonliving as they please and create new life, the fruits and creations of human knowledge can never exceed the limits of the human intellect. In the eyes of nature, actions that arise from human knowledge are all futile.
When man says that he is capable of knowing nature, to “know” does not mean to grasp and understand the true essence of nature. It means only that man knows that nature which he is able to know.
Just as the world known to a frog in a well is not the entire world but only the world within that well, so the nature that man can perceive and know is only that nature which he has been able to grasp with his own hands and his own subjectivity. But of course, this is not true nature.
Nature as one :
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.
Nature is one. There is no starting point or destination, only an unending flux, a continuous metamorphosis of all things. Even this may be said not to exist. The true essence of nature then is “nothingness.” It is here that the real starting point and destination are to be found. To make nature our foundation is to begin at “nothing” and make this point of departure our destination as well; to start off from “nothing” and return to “nothing.” We should not make conditions directly before us a platform from which to launch new improvements. Instead, we must distance ourselves from the immediate situation, and observing it at a remove— from the standpoint of Mu, seek to return to Mu nature.
The earth is an organically interwoven community of plants, animals, and microorganisms. When seen through man’s eyes, it appears either as a model of the strong consuming the weak or of coexistence and mutual benefit. Yet there are food chains and cycles of matter; there is endless transformation without birth or death. Although this flux of matter and the cycles in the biosphere can be perceived only through direct intuition, our unswerving faith in the omnipotence of science has led us to analyze and study these phenomena, raining down destruction upon the world of living things and throwing nature as we see it into disarray.
Viewed up close, organic causal relationships can be resolved into causes and effects, but when examined holistically, no effects and causes are to be found. There is nothing to get ahold of, so all measures are futile. Nature has neither beginning nor end, before nor after, cause nor effect. Causality does not exist.
Nature is entirely self-contained. In its eternal cycles of change, never is there the slightest extravagance or waste. All the products of the human intellect—which has strayed far from the bosom of nature—and ail man’s labors are doomed to end in vain.
Properly speaking, nature is neither living nor dead. Nor is it small or large, weak or strong, feeble or thriving. It is those who believe only in science who call an insect either a pest or a predator and cry out that nature is a violent world of relativity and contradiction in which the strong feed on the weak. Notions of right and wrong, good and bad, are alien to nature. These are only distinctions invented by man. Nature maintained a great harmony without such notions, and brought forth the grasses and trees without the “helping” hand of man.
This may seem very difficult, but may also appear very easy because the world beyond immediate reality is actually nothing more than the world as it was prior to human awareness of reality. A look from afar at the total picture is no better than a look up close at a small part because both are one inseparable whole.
This undivided and inseparable unity is the “nothingness” that must be understood as it is. To start from Mu and return to Mu, that is natural farming.
A true dialogue between man and nature is impossible. Man can stand before nature and talk to it, but nature will not call out to man. Man thinks he can know God and nature, but God and nature neither know man nor tell him anything. Instead, they look the other way.
Surrendering :
All begins by relinquishing human knowledge.
Man is not in a position to know nature.
The best plan, then, is true non-action; it is no plan at all.
My greatest fear today is that of nature being made the plaything of the human intellect. There is also the danger that man will attempt to protect nature through the medium of human knowledge, without noticing that nature can be restored only by abandoning our preoccupation with knowledge and action that has driven it to the wall.
Once we accept that nature has been harmed by human knowledge and action, and renounce these instruments of chaos and destruction, nature will recover its ability to nurture all forms of life. In a sense, my path to natural farming is a first step toward the restoration of nature.
No matter how hard he tries, man can never rule over nature. What he can do is serve nature, which means living in accordance with its laws.
When he turns back to nature and seeks to learn the essence of a tree or a blade of grass, man will have no need for human knowledge. It will be enough to live in concert with nature, free of plans, designs, and effort. One can break free of the false image of nature conceived by the human intellect only by becoming detached and earnestly begging for a return to the absolute realm of nature. No, not even entreaty and supplication are necessary; it is enough only to farm the earth free of concern and desire.
Natural farming, the true and original form of agriculture, is the methodless method of nature, the unmoving way of Bodhidharma. Although appearing fragile and vulnerable, it is potent for it brings victory unfought; it is a Buddhist way of farming that is boundless and yielding, and leaves the soil, the plants, and the insects to themselves.
Until the day that people understand what is meant by “doing nothing”—the ultimate goal of natural farming, they will not relinquish their faith in the omnipotence of science.
We can either choose to see the soil as imperfect and take hoe in hand, or trust the soil and leave the business of working it to nature.
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.
The path of a “do-nothing” nature where all one does is to plunge into the bosom of nature, shedding body and mind, this is the road that true man must walk. The. shortest path to attaining the state of true man is an open existence with simple garments and a simple diet, praying down to the earth and up to the heavens.
True and free happiness comes by being ordinary; it is to be found only by following the extraordinary, methodless road of the farmer, irrespective of the age or direction.
Spiritual development and resurrection are not possible if one strays from this road of humanity.
In a sense, farming was the simplest and also the grandest work allowed of man. There was nothing else for him to do and nothing else that he should have done.
No “method” is needed for loving nature. The only road to nature is non-action, the only method is no method at all. All one must do is to do nothing. The means will become clear of itself and the goal absurdly easy to attain.
The road back to the land, back to the bosom of a pure, innocent nature still remains open to us all.
Some self-explaining pics: