Tuesday Evening Study
Class is from 8-9pm Pacific Time, after zazen and a short break (you can arrive or leave any time). Click here to view the practice schedule. You are welcome to join our class series for free at any time, at any point in the series, and there is no need to register. Each class can be accessible and enjoyable even if you haven’t attended previous classes in a series. Missed a Class? Classes and Dharma Talks are almost always recorded; click here for recordings.
Summer 2026 Study Series:
The Sandokai, or Harmony of Difference and Sameness
Led by Domyo, with plenty of opportuities for discussion
Sandokai is an ancient teaching poem composed by Chinese Zen master Sekito Kisen (Shitou Xiqian, 700-790). It’s recited daily in Soto Zen temples throughout the world and deals with an issue of paramount importance in Zen: the relationship between the relative and absolute dimensions of reality.
Absolute and relative are terms that describe two profoundly different aspects of reality – the relative aspect, in which everything is defined by difference and particularity, and the absolute aspect, in which everything is part of a seamless whole. Both aspects are simultaneously true, even though they may appear contradictory, just as a finger is a thing unto itself, defined by its separateness from other fingers, but is also simply part of a hand.
The relationship between absolute and relative isn’t just a topic for philosophical debate, it’s something we human beings care about a great deal. We get a sense there’s a whole lot more to life than our ordinary, limited, self-centered perception of it. When meditating, praying, listening to wonderful music, hiking in the wilderness, or just drinking a cup of tea, we may perceive how everything is precious just as it is, how there’s order in the universe, how God is within, how all human beings are fundamentally the same and therefore naturally inclined to compassion, or how nothing is inherently separate from anything else. Oh, how inspiring and glorious!
And then the moment passes and we’re back in the world of good and bad, right and wrong, dirty houses, afflictive emotions, passionate disagreements, and traffic jams – not to mention injustice, war, and environmental destruction. How are we supposed to reconcile these two aspects of reality? For many of us, the absolute aspect seems preferable but frustratingly elusive, setting up a sad tension in our spiritual lives.
Study Materials
Feel free to join the class at any time, it isn’t necessary to have attended previous classes or to have done any listening/reading outside of class – although such study will increase your appreciation of the study.
- Domyo’s Podcast (two episodes, audio and text): Sekito Kisen’s Sandokai: The Identity of Relative and Absolute – In the podcast episode, Domyo comments on the Sandokai line by line.
- Domyo’s Explanation of the Sandokai Line by Line (a chart)
- Domyo’s Handy Dandy Chart of Relative and Absolute (The Two Aspects or Sides of Reality from a Chan/Zen Perspective)
- Shunryu Suzuki’s book Branching Streams Flow in the Darkness. (Amazon link provided for reference, not as an endorsement)
Schedule (flexible, we may take longer to move through the material than this):
The mind of the great sage of India is intimately transmitted from west to east.
While human faculties are sharp or dull, the Way has no northern or southern ancestors.
The spiritual source shines clear in the light; the branching streams flow on in the dark.
Grasping at things is surely delusion; according with sameness is still not enlightenment.
All the objects of the senses interact and yet do not.
Interacting brings involvement. Otherwise, each keeps its place.
Sights vary in quality and form, sounds differ as pleasing or harsh. Refined and common speech come together in the dark, clear and murky phrases are distinguished in the light.
The four elements return to their natures just as a child turns to its mother; Fire heats, wind moves, water wets, earth is solid.
Eye and sights, ear and sounds, nose and smells, tongue and tastes; Thus with each and every thing, depending on these roots, the leaves spread forth.
Trunk and branches share the essence; revered and common, each has its speech.
In the light there is darkness, but don’t take it as darkness; In the dark there is light, but don’t see it as light.
Light and dark oppose one another like the front and back foot in walking.
Each of the myriad things has its merit, expressed according to function and place.
Phenomena exist; box and lid fit. Principle responds; arrow points meet.
Hearing the words, understand the meaning; don’t set up standards of your own.
If you don’t understand the Way right before you, how will you know the path as you walk?
Progress is not a matter of far or near, but if you are confused, mountains and rivers block your way.
I respectfully urge you who study the mystery, do not pass your days and nights in vain.
