In the history of Zen, there are 28 ancestors in the west and 6 ancestors in the east. The twenty-eighth ancestor of the Western Heaven is bodhidharma, the twenty-seventh ancestor of Zen Buddhism. The six ancestors of Dongtu are the six generations who spread Zen to Dongtu after Dharma crossed the sea to China. Namely, Dharma, Hui Ke, the ancestor of Dongtu, Monk Can, Daoxin, Hongren and Huineng. From Dharma, the ancestor, to Huineng, the sixth ancestor, all adopted the method of "passing orders and determining orders" to determine that one disciple was an authentic descendant of Zen and the other disciples were collateral, not authentic.

However, Huineng, the sixth ancestor, broke this convention and stopped passing on the mantle, that is, the so-called "mantle stopped passing on", which made his disciples have no distinction between authentic and collateral, and they were all disciples who passed on the dharma. Disciples spread among themselves, greatly expanding the scope of Huineng Zen. In the end, Huineng Nanzong Zen surpassed the Beizong Zen taught by Shen Xiu, another disciple of the Five Ancestors, and became the real founder and popularization of China Zen, achieving the effect of "ruling the world by law". So China Zen has only six ancestors, but no seven.

Although in the history of Zen, Shen Xiu was crowned as the "sixth ancestor" in the heyday of Northern Zen, and his disciples Puji and Yi Fu were also called the "seventh ancestor", after Southern Zen defeated Northern Zen, his "hero" Heze God was also called the "seventh ancestor", but it was not recognized in the history of Zen. Therefore, Dongtu Zen has only six ancestors.

But it doesn't mean that Zen can only be handed down for six generations. China Zen was born in the early Tang Dynasty, flourished in the middle Tang Dynasty and declined to the Southern Song Dynasty. Its legal context continues to this day. How can it be said that it can only be passed down to six generations? From the early Tang Dynasty to the middle Tang Dynasty, there were as many as six generations.

The above table is only the spread process of Zen from Huineng, the sixth ancestor, to seven schools of five schools. For example, six ancestors came to Yi Xuan, then to Chu Yuan, and then to Fang Hui and Huinan. Chu Yuan lived in the early Northern Song Dynasty, more than 300 years later than the birth of Zen. How can it only be passed down to six generations?