Abstract: In the “classical narrations” about the history of Chinese Chan Buddhism, its northern sect seemed to be only a footnote and even disappeared after the Song Dynasty. From the angle of the intellectual history, this paper makes a survey of the history of the northern Zen in the late Ming Dynasty under the background of “Shurangama scholarship”. The northern Chan finally obtained its legality and right to speak on the ground of popularization of Shurangama Sutra hundreds of years later. And it became a hot topic concerning Chan thought in the late Ming Dynasty. To some extent, it reflected introspections on the Buddhist tradition itself.

Key words: The Shurangama Sutra, late Ming Dynasty, northern Chan Buddhism