Prepared Valerian: The Secret of Finished Compost
My research into the valerian preparation began in June of
1999 at the JPI preparation-making seminar when I
noticed a difference between the way we were being shown
to use it and the indication as given by Rudolf Steiner.
Prior to that moment the use of the preparations was
something that I took on faith-that is to say, I did not
understand how and why they worked; I only knew from
Alex Podolinsky’s lectures1 that they did, and in a nearmiraculous
way that seemed to me to be the agricultural
equivalent of walking on water. Nor could I make any
sense out of the Agriculture Course2; the ideas expressed
in these talks were wholly enigmatic and entirely incomprehensible
to me.
I also could not understand why none of the farms I
had previously visited that used the preparations could
produce anything like Podolinsky’s published results with
tilth; the creation of thirty inches of topsoil (twelve percent
organic matter in the top four inches) in six years
using nothing but preparations, rock dust and subsoil
plowing. What was he doing with them that nobody else
was?
There was a profound mystery here. It occurred to me
that the answer to that mystery might be found in the
way the preparations were made and used.
At the JPI seminar I heard one thing from Hugh
Courtney above all else, which was this: every word
Steiner uses has significance. Keeping this in mind, I
began to read, very slowly and carefully, one word at a
time, the indication for prepared valerian and all at once
it made perfect sense to me.
This insight can be summarized in the following way:
A close reading of the indication text reveals that prepared
valerian is correctly applied only to the finished pile.
Think about the meaning of the words “. . . before using
this treated manure. . .”3 and you will realize that “treated
manure” really means, “treated fertilizer”, since you can’t
actually use “manure” until it has become “fertilizer”.
And indeed, in the German, Duenger is correctly translated
as “fertilizer” rather than just “manure”, and therefore
refers to a finished product.
How astonishing then to learn that traditional practice
applies prepared valerian to the unfinished pile, when
Steiner clearly does not say to do that at all !
On the contrary, his actual directions state explicitly
that prepared valerian is applied only when the pile has
become usable substance.
That is to say, with just five words Steiner describes in a
very clear and self-evident manner an application sequence
which, apparently, no one ever seems to have read.
What is going on here? How can this be?
Steiner says elsewhere that people are not yet accustomed
to reading his books very closely . This would still
seem to be the case today because, as you see, there is no
basis in the indication text for applying valerian preparation
to a pile not ready for use.
I then began to pursue this line of thought a bit further.
To begin with, we must grasp more precisely the difference
between “fertilizer” and “manure” when we read
the indication for procedure instructions. People for years
have been saying “manuring” when they mean, “fertilizing”;
but “manure” is not “fertilizer” either in German or
English. Knowing the difference between them explains
why valerian preparation is applied to “fertilizer” and the
other five are applied to “manure”; the principles at work
behind their effects run along opposite lines.
Review briefly each of the preparation-making procedures
and you will find that valerian is the only preparation
not exposed to the solidifying winter crystallization
process below the Earth; it remains instead a liquid dilution
of the summer blossoming process above the Earth.
Note well the polarities you see here.
They are winter/summer; solid/liquid; below/above the
Earth; and crystallization/blossoming. These are sequentially
opposite natural processes that produce correspondingly
opposite forces in substances exposed to them.
Likewise, compost preparations produce effects in the same
natural order used to create them. Just as summer follows
winter, one process begins where the work of the other ends.
Knowing the order in which the forces develop in
making the preparations also tells us the order in which
effects must occur in using them.
The winter crystallization process concentrates forces
within substance. Summer blossoming processes release
forces from substance. The five solid winter preparations
create a structured, inwardly organized substance in the
finished pile that is mobilized into outward activity in the
life of the soil by the liquid summer preparation. Compost
becomes a substance by a winter crystallization
process; this substance becomes usable through a summer
dissolution process.
Why then is prepared valerian effective only on the substance
of a finished pile?
Because it is a potentized dilution (like all homeopathic
preparations made in the same way), the release of
its radiant effect is instantaneous but momentary. Valerian
preparation requires the colloidal humus structure of
finished compost in order to deliver its effect.
The force of this momentary impulse is lost in an
unfinished pile because there is no unified structure in
place to absorb its impact. Such a unified structure is created
and refined by the metabolic uptake of the first five
preparations.
The same principle of potentized dilution effects
applies to the use of Horn Manure, Horn Silica, and
Equisetum preparations; all the liquid preparations work
by extending or amplifying the resonant forces contained
in the substances of the soil or plant they act upon.
What happens to the compost when the effect of valerian
preparation is lost?
According to the indication, prepared valerian activates
phosphorus, or “light-bearing” substance. Phosphorus is
the switch that turns on the “light” which catalyses the
crystallized fertility of the finished compost into energy
available for plants. Losing this effect means that the radiant
force of the compost never gets “turned on”, and as a
result the effect of the field sprays will lack a characteristic
intensity.
“Light” is also the structuring power of the ego organization
(“uprightness”) carried by phosphorus through the
fertilized cow manure. Without the right amount of
“light” activity the humus structure of the soil that sustains
the agricultural individuality either falls apart and mineralizes
into dust or stagnates into a swamp-like condition.
As it happens, Alex Podolinsky’s Prepared 500 applies
valerian preparation to the colloidal humus of finished
Horn Manure. This usage is consistent with the sequence
given by Steiner and may explain (along with good farming
practices) the phenomenal depth, fertility and structure
of Podolinsky’s soils; the “light” switch has been
turned on and the agricultural individuality can see its
path illuminated everywhere into the Earth.
You can try this sequence with the valerian preparation
yourself over the next year or two, and record the changes
in the depth and quality of your soil structure in the way
Podolinsky describes in his lectures.
My research over the past two years to further develop
the parameters of this insight includes a pharmacology of
valerian in its medicinal and spiritual effects, a precise
indication translation from the German, a description of
the chemistry and physics principles embedded in the
language Steiner uses, and a discussion of a variety of
techniques and applications, some traditional and some
new, that may be of interest to practitioners.4
This is a work in progress that invites response and
seeks to stimulate the experiments that will verify these
ideas and explore their implications. It outlines a view of
this preparation that is at once both buried beneath an
obscure text and yet stands as if hidden in plain sight.
You may wonder, as I have, why someone has not discovered
this use of prepared valerian long before now.
Most discoveries appear obvious only in hindsight; the
indication for valerian calls little or no attention to itself,
and under ordinary circumstances it would never have
occurred to me to notice it. The indication provokes no
real curiosity or interest, especially after having to ponder
the preceding indications. It just doesn’t make much of
an impression the first few times you see it and weigh its
content in your mind. This weak impression has consigned
it to obscurity.
Valerian preparation is almost, you might say, invisible;
it exists as a kind of blind spot and so over the years,
nobody has had much to say about it. Had the indication
for valerian never been given, none of our books about
the preparations would need very much revising.
In reality, however, it asks from us an effort beyond our
usual capability.
Unless we can call forth within ourselves a perspective
from above, the information it contains escapes our
notice and the indication remains indecipherable in the
ordinary sense.
Truly observing these inner processes in oneself moves
us to re-examine all that we think we know about the
preparations in the light of their spiritual foundations;
right preparation use is in fact a method of accelerating
our spiritual evolution.
The Agriculture Course was met with almost universal
incomprehension at the time Steiner gave it, and to some
extent this is still the case today. We continue to interpret
what he says according to our “education”, and this predisposition
then renders the information he gives us psychologically
inaccessible.
What is the path to understanding preparation use?
Steiner gives us two clear instructions for the future of
his agriculture indications. The first is to use them and
then to conduct experiments to verify that we know how
to use them. The second is to then spread their use as far
and wide over the Earth as possible.
Alex Podolinsky’s initiative in Australia seems to me to
be an experimental verification of the right use of the
preparations spread over a wide area, and therefore fulfills
both Steiner directives. His example can enable us to produce
comparable results, provided we are willing and able
to learn from it.
For without such results Steiner’s agriculture will
shortly cease to exist in America. It is in fact already
legally dead here, having been made indistinguishable by
law from “organic” agriculture. While nothing harmful
in itself, “organics” is far too weak to support evolving
human life on the Earth very much beyond the immediately
foreseeable future. Nor has “organics” the moral and
spiritual power to shift the current materialistic agribusiness
paradigm, but will instead be co-opted and made to
accommodate.
If this unique way of life is to rise again from the dead
and distinguish itself in the way Steiner indicated, on this
continent, it must be taken up by a generation of farmers
who can absorb and manifest in themselves the gift and
power of the Spirit of the Earth.
It is this future generation of farmers in America for
whom this study is intended.
Summer Solstice,
In the last year of the 2nd millennium ad,
Under the earnest gaze of Uriel.
Notes
1) Alex Podolinsky, Biodynamic Agriculture, Volumes 1 and
2 (St. Leonard’s, Australia: Gavemer Press, 1985).
2) Rudolf Steiner, Spiritual Foundations for the Renewal of
Agriculture (Kimberton, PA: Bio-Dynamic Farming
and Gardening Association, 1993).
3) Steiner, op. cit., 104.
4) This research is available upon request by contacting Joe
Stevens, 31 Bethwood Drive, Loudonville, NY 12211;
voicemail: (518)465-9472; e-mail: <jas5261956@hotmail.
com>.