"If persons on different sides of the glove were independently to discover that bodies fall at the rate of sixteen feet per second squared, this would be taken as evidence that they had learned something about nature -- about the world and how it works. We see something like this at work in the sadhanas (spiritual paths) of St. John and Dogen. Though the Christian saint and the Zen master are leaves on quite different trees, similarities between then [sic], qua contemplatives, exist at a level profound enough to encourage the exploration of common ground. Ultimately this common ground invites us to go beyond San Juan and Dogen to the contemplative gesture in its universal nature. In other words, though San Juan and Dogen stand in the foreground of this thesis, they are, in the end, only doorways. We are seeking what their lives and teachings open onto: the essential elements of the human contemplative gesture and its psychotransformative power." ~ from the text