Sanshin Zen Community is a Soto Zen sangha

Sangha

Sangha is a word in Pali or Sanskrit that can be translated roughly as "association" or "assembly," "company" or "community" with common goal, vision or purpose...

 in Bloomington, IN founded in 1996 by Shohaku Okumura

Shohaku Okumura

Shohaku Okumura is a Japanese Soto Zen priest and the founder and guiding teacher of the Sanshin Zen Community located in Bloomington, Indiana, where he and his family currently live...

. The style of practice at this zendo

Zendo

or is a Japanese term translating roughly as "meditation hall". In Zen Buddhism, the zen-dō is a spiritual dōjō where zazen is practiced...

 follows the lineage of Kosho Uchiyama

Kosho Uchiyama

was a Sōtō priest, origami master, and the former abbot of Antaiji near Kyoto, Japan.The author of more than twenty books on Zen Buddhism and origami—of which Opening the Hand of Thought: Foundations of Zen Buddhist Practice is best-known—Uchiyama graduated from Waseda University with a masters...

-roshi and his teacher, Kodo Sawaki

Kodo Sawaki

is considered by some to be the most important Japanese Zen master of the 20th century. His parents died early, and he grew up being adopted by a gambler and an ex-prostitute. When he was 16, he ran away from home to become a monk at Eihei-ji, one of the two main temples of Sōtō Zen. At first...

-roshi, who founded Antaiji temple, and greatly simplified the Soto Zen forms used there. The temple name, Sanshinji, refers to the 'three minds' cultivated by Zen practice: magnanimous mind, parental mind, and joyful mind. The sangha follows a modified monastic schedule with a retreat each month. Sanshin is one of the few Zen communities offering a sesshin ('without toys') in the style of Uchiyama-roshi, featuring 14 hours of zazen per day with no ceremonies, work, or Dharma talks. Reverend Okumura also offers regular Genzo-e retreats devoted to studying one of the fascicles of Dōgen Zenji's

Dogen

Dōgen Zenji was a Japanese Zen Buddhist teacher born in Kyōto, and the founder of the Sōtō school of Zen in Japan after travelling to China and training under the Chinese Caodong lineage there...

 Shōbōgenzō

Shobogenzo

The term Shōbōgenzō has three main usages in Buddhism: It can refer to the essence of the Buddha's realization and teaching, that is, to the Buddha Dharma itself, as viewed from the perspective of Mahayana Buddhism, it is the title of a koan collection with commentaries by Dahui Zonggao, and it...

; he also travels to give them at other prominent North American Zen Centers.