Shen-hsiu ［神秀］ (d. 706) (PY Shenxiu;  Jinshū): The founder of the Northern school of Zen (Ch’an) in China. As a young man, he studied Buddhism and the Taoist philosophy of Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu. In 625 he entered the priesthood at Lo-yang. In 655 he met Hung-jen, the fifth patriarch of Chinese Zen, and practiced seated meditation under his guidance. Thereafter he left his teacher and continued his practice alone for fifteen years. In 700, at the invitation of Empress Wu, he propagated Zen in Ch’ang-an and Lo-yang in the north, teaching the traditional Zen doctrine of the gradual attainment of enlightenment. The lineage of his teaching therefore came to be called the Northern school of Zen. The Northern school rapidly declined after his death, however. The Southern school of Zen, carried on by Hui-neng, who formulated the doctrine of sudden enlightenment, came to predominate in China.