"Disappearance of the method:--My disciples being unable
p. 483 [JPTS'86,3433
to realize the trances, the insights, the Paths, and the Fruits, will keep only the four purities of conduct. Then as time goes on they will keep only the commandments forbidding the four deadly sins. As long as there are a hundred or a thousand priests who keep the commandments forbidding the four deadly sins, the disappearance of the method will not have occurred. But when the last priest shall break the precepts, or shall die, the method will have disappeared.
The Sangha will become non-existant because people will not continue to teach the Dhamma.
"This, O Sâriputta, is the disappearance of the method.
"Disappearance of learning:--As long as the text of the Three Baskets, which is the word of The Buddha, and as long as their commentaries are extant, the disappearance of learning will not have occurred. But as time goes on there will be irreligious kings of base extraction, and the courtiers and others in authority will be irreligious, and then the country people throughout the kingdom will be irreligious. On account of their irreligion the god will not rain in due season, and the crops will not flourish properly. And when the crops do not flourish, those who are wont to give the reliances to the congregation of the priests will be unable to do so any more.
The suttas will not be taught anymore because the people are becoming irreligious. The Buddha taught everything is ever changing. Nothing is eternal. The suttas are not eternal. They are not divine.
"This, O Sâriputta, is the disappearance of learning.
"Now as time goes on the last of the priests will carry their robes, their bowls, and their tooth-sticks after the manner of the naked ascetics....[they will say] 'What do we want with this?' and they will throw away the piece of yellow cloth and persecute the wild animals and birds of the forest, and thus the disappearance of the symbols will have occurred.
The priests of the Sangha will desert the Dhamma. The Dhamma doesn't decay just because the Sangha breaks apart.
"This, O Sâriputta, is the disappearance of the symbols and symbols.
"Thereupon, the dispensation of The Supreme Buddha being now five thousand years old, the relics will begin to fail of honor and worship, and will go wherever they can receive honor and worship. But as time goes on they will not receive honor and worship in any place. Then, when the dispensation has disappeared, the relics will come from every place; from the serpent world, from the world of the gods, and from the
Relics and symbols do not last forever. Nothing is eternal in The Buddha's teachings.
"But who shall not behold Metteyya, The Blessed One? and who shall behold him?
"Metteyya excellent, Râma,
Pasenadi Kosala, 'Bhibhû,
Dîghasoni and Samkacca,
Subha, the Brahman Todeyya,
"Nâlâgiri, Palaleyya,
These ten are Future Buddhas now,
And in due course, in time to come,
Wisdom Supreme shall they attain."
There is nothing different between this and The Buddha's teachings. All Buddhas taught the same thing about wisdom of the Dhamma and what it means to be enlightened.