法苑珠林 90.27

90.27

Furthermore, the Most Wondrous Samādhi Sūtra states: "A thousand years later, during a period of three hundred years, there will be vast turmoil! Fleeing male and female slaves and those from ruined and fallen states who mostly cannot survive will enter my Dharma, just like bands of thieves robbing the virtuous. At that time, the twelve branches of scriptures will sink into the earth, and no one will recite the sūtras anymore. Even if there are those who practice dhūta, most will not follow the Dharma, constantly roaming among villages rather than staying in mountain forests. As for Dharma masters explaining the Buddha's words, not one in ten thousand will hit the mark. At that time, there will be many laypeople, both men and women, who observe the precepts and practice purity, rebuking the bhikṣus. After the laypeople leave, they will say to one another: 'What I now understand is just as spoken from the Buddha's own mouth!' Or they will take heterodox speech, ornamental speech, and meaningless talk to be meaningful words, like a blind person pointing to the sun in the sky, talking of whether it is large or small, and so forth."