Masanobu Fukuoka
I truly admire the writings/ideas of this elder Japanese fellow.

Fukuoka san wrote:

"If a single new bud is snipped off a fruit tree with a pair of scissors, that may bring about a disorder which cannot be undone. Human beings with their tampering do something wrong, leave the damage unrepaired, and when the adverse results accumulate, work with all their might to correct them."

"To become one with nature -- agriculture is an occupation in which a farmer adapts himself to nature. To do that, you have to gaze at a rice plant and listen to the words from the plant. If you understand what the rice says, you just adjust your heart to that of the rice plants and raise them. In reality, we do not have to raise them. They will grow. We just serve nature. A piece of advice I need to give you here. When I say gaze at a rice plant or stare at its true form, it does not mean to make an observation or to contemplate the rice plant, which makes it an object different from yourself. It is very difficult to explain in words. In a sense, it is important that you become the rice plant. Just as you, as the subject of gazing, have to disappear. If you do not understand what you should do or what I am talking about, you should be absorbed in taking care of the rice without looking aside. If you could work wholeheartedly without yourself, that is enough. Giving up your ego is the shortest way to unification with nature."

To Masanobu Fukuoka, raising food is not necessarily the primary goal of farming.

"The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops,
but the cultivation and perfection of human beings."

In his books, Fukuoka describes Natural Farming as ".. a Buddhist way of farming that originates in the philosophy of 'Mu' or nothingness, and returns to a 'do-nothing' nature." He writes about Mahayana Natural Farming (Mahayana is one of the two major schools or sects of Buddhism) as ".. the very embodiment of life in accordance with nature.. [it] 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."

When asked if he felt that he was receiving insight and guidance from a divine source, Fukuoka responded with the following:

"Although natural farming, since it can teach people to cultivate a deep understanding of nature - may lead to spiritual insight, it's not strictly a spiritual practice. Natural farming is just farming, nothing more. You don't have to be a spiritually oriented person to practice my methods. Anyone who can approach these concepts with a clear, open mind will be starting off well. In fact, the person who can most easily take up natural agriculture is the one who doesn't have any of the common adult obstructing blocks of desire, philosophy, or religion... the person who has the mind and heart of a child. One must simply know nature... real nature, not the one we think we know!"

Fukuoka went on to explain: "Many people think that when we practice agriculture, nature is helping us in our efforts to grow food. This is an exclusively human-centered viewpoint... we should instead, realize that we are receiving that which nature decides to give us. A farmer does not grow something in the sense that he or she creates it. That human is only a small part of the whole process by which nature expresses its being. The farmer has very little influence over that process... other than being there and doing his or her small part."