Category: Buddhist

Brocade Book – Occult – Dream 8-9-16

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

Here is last night’s dream

I am in some kind of mansion or Chateau. The rooms are dimly lit by candles and gaslight. The furniture is period. The walls are dressed in curtain like hangings stretching floor to ceiling. The colour is a boudoir red / purple. There is a sense of fading Victorian even tsarist grandeur. In the distance I can hear a social function, a party. There are harpsichords playing, laughter and chatter. I wander around the room; it is well-kept but overly opulent and not to my liking. I walk past a table, with ornate carved legs and I trail my hand along the tabletop.

Next, I am in an ultra-modern museum which has a Germanic or Swiss feel. It is somehow on top of a mountain and very high up. The museum is minimalist. There are only a very few glass cabinets. They contain artefacts in gold and other metals. Each has a slip of paper in the cabinet with a date and a small explanation. Many of the artefacts are oriental, Buddhist and relate way back. They are very precious, and security is high. I come upon a case; it appears to be empty. In the case is a slip of white paper saying Dr A.G.Taylor and a list of the universities that he worked at. There is no date. I get excited and go to find the curator. I say to her that this is me…can I have look at what is in the exhibit? She puts on her white gloves and with a golden key attached to her neck chain she opens the drawer below the exhibit case. She pulls out a book, a much valued manuscript. It is kept out of sight to preserve it. It is about standard book size. The book has a cover, even a cage, of the finest golden filigree brocade, exquisitely carved and put together. It is in raised almost moving relief. The cover of the book is white and although not glossy it somehow shines. The whole thing shines and glows. It is radiant. She makes me put on white gloves and hands it to me. I marvel at the book and open it. Both she and I know that it is I who wrote this book.

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The scene changes to another room deep in the vaults of the museum. It is where all the treasures are kept. The floor is of white marble and the room has two levels split by a small half staircase. At the staircase are wall length curtains held back by a fancy golden coloured tie. The curtains are of luxuriant red with a yellow gold coloured backing. I wander through the room looking at the artefacts. Many are to do with magic of both light and dark varieties. I instinctively know which is which and what they are for. As I wander through the room, I get the sensation of something, some being, watching me. I know that it is not benign. So, I “swell up” and fill myself with energy. I open my hands so as to distribute {if needed} and say out loud. “I know you are there, show yourself!!” It is an occult command of very high order. The curtains at the stair flutter in the breeze and I know that whatever it was, it has gone.

The dream ends. I know that it is highly significant. I pause to recollect and store it. I go back to sleep.

On typing today the word Grimoire popped into mind.

Glowing Skelton – Third Universe – Dream 17-11-2012

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Here are some excerpts from what was a lengthy dreaming sequence.

Against a dark backdrop I see an image of myself. I am superimposed upon a glowing skeleton which has pink, fluorescent blood vessels. It is living. The two images or my normal body and the skeleton pulse back and forth in precedence. I am become death the destroyer of worlds.

In the dream I wonder if this is a harbinger of my own death. It is not it has only symbolic value…

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I know that the world of this dream in an intermediate world between life and death.

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I am shown three worlds as three circles / spheres and written upon each world in vivid dripping pink lettering are the following:

The world of starving Spirits

The world of the Hungry Ghosts

The world of the in between.

I know in the dream that this current universe is the third manifested universe and to understand the true nature of Bardo and karma I will need to expand my consciousness so that it can stretch backwards to the times of previous universal manifestations. This will be a part of my training.

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  • Sometimes the nagal or spirit is seen as a luminous pinks shade.

This from 18th May 2012 was more of a vision and seems related to this so I have appended it here:

I see a scene with four “men” dressed in different pastel-coloured robes breaking through into consciousness. They are “pastel” blue, pink, yellow and white, which are mildly and softly radiant.

They are waiting for me on the beach. Their facial features are not easily discernible. They are the four Lords of Karma, the Lipika Lords.

Renunciation or Self-Sabotage?

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The human ability to kid oneself is well known though for those kidding, difficult to accept. At the moment there are many who deem the slaughter in Gaza justifiable and apt. They do not imagine any karmic consequences because that notion would be very inconvenient. Irrespective of how things are temporarily brought to a close, there will be consequences ongoing.

The normal idea of success in the “West” might be to have a good career, make progress, climb the housing ladder and perhaps have a relationship or marriage and thence to propagate the species. One might like a nice car and pleasant foreign holidays. Perhaps gaining some measure of societal kudos along the way. One would not sulkily throw one’s toys out of the cot; one would comply more or less to the norm. Psychology might point you in this direction.

If for example you are a bodhisattva called Siddartha Gautama, it would be OK to run out on a young wife and child, leave the palace of your father the King and renounce the kingdom to which you are heir. But for normal people this would be wrong.

Viewed from one angle this is an ungrateful act of wanton self-sabotage. Siddhartha shot himself in the foot and abandoned a pleasant life, one which many might aspire to. To the starving, the poor and the unshod this makes no sense. Yet according to legend this subsequently facilitated his teaching and his completion of the career goal of any bodhisattva, namely enlightenment and Buddhahood.

In the post previous I pointed at something that many would not understand. I shelved a high value job at a prestigious space agency. The successful completion of which could have opened the way for senior positions and a way back from the “wilderness”. We would have had plenty of cash.

There were a number of warning omens when we were viewing properties in and near Leiden. Retrospect suggests that the job was a temptation of sorts.

Earlier I walked out of a marriage with a very young child which caused the sale of a house in London now worth £ 1 million. I left a new age group which I gave heart and soul to establish. I “gave” my shares back to a start-up company the vision for which was to a fair extent mine. I quit a then tenured academic job at a top university, something to which many aspired. I had no other job lined up just a few training courses. One of these went pear shaped so I gave them up too. To move from a highly timetabled job into near nothing was a bit of a shock to the system. I resigned from another short lived university teaching post. I cut contact with my aged mother. I forwent relations with family.

None of these were easy. I am not a prince.

One could say that I am simply a loser who could not hack it.

One could say that these were acts of stepwise renunciation. The integral over micro-renunciations has a similar effect to sudden departure.

 Or one could call deem them all the INFJ door slam, a fault in my character.

What is it that seeks success? It is the self and not the Soul. In this logic renunciation is indeed an act of self-sabotage. The ambitions of the self are stymied in stepwise succession. I know that I can live without any of these accoutrements. If you like I have physical plane proof by experience. I am not bound by the fear of missing out on a normal successful life.

I could be kidding myself. Trying to find an excuse for my squandering of opportunity. Or maybe I have simply thrown my toys out of my cot because things did not go my way.

Nobody else has experienced these things like I did. Nobody else has felt the tearing, the ripping. I am alone in my moccasins which I may not loan to another.

People might have opinions.

I cannot return to the trajectory my life was once on. Any attempt has gone badly awry. The dramatic might say that I am not meant to. Or one could argue that it is the karma of wanton squandering. I made the bed and now I must sleep in it.

There remains one question concerning what if anything I do with the remainder of earthly sojourn.

Hmnn…

Guardian – Elephant – Dream 14-9-13

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In the dream and the dreaming….

I am shown a map. It is a map of Japan. On the East side of Japan there is a place. It is The Gateway to freedom and enlightenment. I am the Guardian of this place.

No-one passes through – except by me.

People are annoyed that there is only one such place. It is not “where” people think it is. Nor can it be found as a physical locality, for it does not have one.

Many seek it, but it cannot be found, except through me.

People think that this Gateway is guarded by dogs or savage beasts.  It is not. It is guarded by an Elephant and that Elephant is me.

Many seek this Gateway but they are all using the wrong methods. I am the Guardian of the Gateway. It is a place and yet not a place.

Dream ends.

Goal Orientation – Suffering and Dissatisfaction

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If you search for “coaching” you will find many people offering their services as coaches and often a part of this is setting goals or targets for success and advancement. Few notice the similarity of goal and gaol. People can become prisoners of their goal orientation. Society is obsessed with measurable metrics and tick lists of things to do, to the extent that life can be a wearisome endless list of devoirs. It is de rigueur to have goals and ambition it seems.

Siddartha wanted so badly to end suffering for all sentient beings, suffering, or dukka, can be translated as dissatisfaction.

I’ll make a statement: goal orientation is directly causal of dissatisfaction.

If you fail to make a goal you are dissatisfied, if you make a goal, you are temporarily done but the next goal awaits lurking on the horizon. Any “satisfaction” is fleeting. This measurement obsession more often than not suggests some measure of inadequacy, could do better.

People then have massive internal dialogue about whether of not they are meeting their goals. Internal dialogue is nearly always negative and hence the being suffers unnecessarily because of this internal “mental” cacophony.

Goal orientation and rush often skip hand in hand. Focussed only on the goal there is a tendency to finish quick and this can cause poor application to task and lower standards. Goal orientation can prevent impeccability. Eye on goal one does not fully absorb into whatever it is one is doing. There are distractions from other pending goals. Quality suffers on the noose of measurable quantity. Goals hang.

The antithesis of spiritual development is rush. It is impossible to rush it, but many try and seek milestones to prove progress. The hangover of societal obsession with goal orientation is difficult to ease.

Striving is a form of suffering.

Relaxation and complete absorption is the antidote. Complete absorption brings completion but without obsessional suffering. Complete absorption quietens the internal dialogue and therefore reduces dissatisfaction. Everyone knows when they have been impeccable. Impeccability is not an absolute. If you give completely of your current very best that is all you can do, this never brings dissatisfaction. Subsequent comparative internal dialogue can cause the nine headed hydra of dissatisfaction to rise again.

Internal dialogue is a primary cause of dissatisfaction and suffering.

Endless measuring is causal of dissatisfaction and suffering.

Comparison mind is directly causal of dissatisfaction.

Rational thinking causes dissatisfaction. Therefore, rational thinking is an irrational unwise thing to do. It does not make sense.

Of course, under certain circumstances one needs some rationality.

If one is ever goal oriented one never experiences the moment, the eternal now, because the goal is very distracting. Not being fully present causes dissatisfaction. If one lives in the twin worlds of what if and if only, there is rarely now. The past whether melancholic or rose tinted, the future whether idealised or catastrophe is not now, it is mind-stuff often of the nature of internal dialogue. Trash.

Goal orientation causes impatience which is a form of dissatisfaction. Goal orientation when one is driving a car is a cause of road rage.

Letting go of goal orientation is liberating.

Try it, having no goals is harder than it might seem, because societal habituation near worships them.

Hence there is suffering and dissatisfaction, which we might call samsara or saṃsāra, which is another term for endless human folly.

The Superpower of Patience

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I’ll speculate that immediacy and the immediacy of gratification are part of the modern way of life for many. People do not like to wait and many suffer badly from premature conclusion which can be messy. The concluding kangaroo can be found easily on all sides and people jump great distances to form dodgy yet firm conclusions without real basis. Many rely on what “they” say and are unwilling or too lazy to look into things themselves.

Śāntideva in the Bodhicharyâvatâra has a whole chapter on the virtues of forbearance which is a close ally of patience. The jewel of awareness forbearance is depicted by tarot 12.

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Sometimes you are required by karma to bear whatever life brings and to do so in as cheerful a manner as possible without pissing and moaning or whingeing like a stuck record. Often there is light at the end of the tunnel and it is not a TGV train oncoming.

This urge for immediacy means that long term policy making is neglected and life is governed by knee jerk reactions and sticking plaster temporary “solutions”. If it can’t be “sorted” quickly people lose interest. This condemns life to the shallows and the profound depths are never plumbed. It is a natural law that depth needs time and application. Concentration without distraction for extended periods brings insights more meaningful than a short flashy TikTok video. If you wait long enough an insight might come along and then just like with busses you may get several.

Humanity is in a rush like never before in some senses.

This means that the superpower of patience is fading and heading towards a mass extinction event. Being patient is not fashionable, nor is it good clickbait. Being patient is for losers. Gimme, gimme, gimme.

Aligning a complicated dye laser to give the best balance of laser power output and narrowness of spectral linewidth is nearly an art form. I refer to it as Zen and the Art of Laser Alignment. If you get twitchy and impatient it can go badly wrong and you are returned back to the start. All the good work can be undone by one or two impatient tweaks of a mirror positioning knob. If you note that you are losing patience, best to stop go out of the room and then come back calm to start again. In the past I could work at laser alignment in four hour sessions.

This loss of patience and hasty reaction is fairly prevalent. If gratification is not immediate interest is lost.

In Buddhism theory even after one has entered the stream it takes several lifetimes to complete liberation. Patience then is a scale. If one can work over many lifetimes that is patient. If one gets annoyed by the slow loading of a Netflix film, that is less patient. We boomers had ~50 kilobyte per second modems, we were initiated into patience thereby.

Pavlovian society is now conditioned to immediacy, buying in a click and getting food delivered to the doorstep in many places.

I wonder if I could survive the massed impatience and accompanying ire / agitation of London these days. For a long time, I was immersed therein. I doubt I could hack it now.

I think it fair to speculate that I am more patient than average. I can sit in a hospital waiting room without my comfort beads, by smartphone. I do not have to scroll frantically.

The need, it seems, for constant distraction is having a detrimental effect on mental health. The data dealers keep pushing more deal baggies of gigabytes at us, encouraging us to use high definition cameras like junkies to make huge files and selling ever more data to satisfy this addiction.

If people could go cold turkey on the taking and publication of all that imagery, the climate would not get so hot.

I think that were we all to better develop our superpower of patience, the world would be a better and perhaps more tolerant place. It would stop being so knee jerk reactive and it might even try to understand differing views and perspectives. It might ease the pervasive malady of premature conclusion.

Dragon Lore Dream 23-11-2024

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This is a short but very intense dream from ~ 4 AM

I am with MF whom I knew as an undergraduate. We are sat in the front room of a British house in which I am living temporarily. He is sat on leather bound armchair. We have invited him over for dinner. We have eaten and are relaxing in front of an open fire.

I am lying on my stomach on the floor. My legs are bent at the knee and moving freely. I am reading my beat-up copy of “The Mists of Dragon Lore”. I can see the well-thumbed yellowed pages. I turn to the back of the book. Inside the hard cover is attached a vellum high quality cream envelope, the flap of which is sealed down with a fine bright red braided fabric. I slowly unwind the fabric and open the flap of the envelope.

With utmost care I pull out a card like piece of paper which is like artist’s paper. Embossed into the paper is an exquisitely drawn oriental dragon. It is in jet black ink and is something to behold. Next to it in fine black calligraphy is written in Kanji is “the famed black dragon”. I show the dragon to M he admires it and thinks it odd that such a print is stored in such a tatty old book.

In the dream I note that this is the very first black dragon I have encountered. I have seen many other colours.

With greatest care I return the artwork to its envelope and retie the seal.

The scene changes and I am now with M in a freight railway carriage. The carriage is empty of goods. M turns to me and says that the mullahs are talking about the coming of a new buddha. I ask if he is referring to the Islamic mullahs. Yes. I say that I know a little bit about Buddhism.

M gets out a prayer mat and places it in one corner of the carriage. He sits on it. Two young white boys, young teenagers, follow suit sitting next to him. Without a prayer mat, I sit next to the youngest boy. I put my hand on his shoulder to comfort him.

The scene changes again and I am no longer in the carriage nor bound by the rails. I can go wherever I want.

Dream ends.

Dice Numerology Mantra and Periodic Table Dream – 20-11-2024

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Here is this morning’s dream segment perhaps following on from my Tibetan Dice dream at the beginning of November. I am in a project to carve some dice out of some Apple wood from our “orchard”.

In the dream I am shown a 3d image of a wooden die rotating in space. I note that the pairs of faces are 1 and 6, 3 and 4, 5 and 2. Each opposing pair adds up to 7 which in the dream I know to be the jewel of awareness 7, or need for guidance. I know that the maximum score of two dice is 12.

In the dream I know that 6 represents Carbon and 1 is Hydrogen. They are chemically fond of each other. Carbon plus Hydrogen is 7.

I picture a periodic table of elements and see 1 – Hydrogen, 2 – Helium, 3 – Lithium, 4 – Beryllium, 5 – Boron and 6 – carbon. I know that 7 is Nitrogen.

I understand that the dice represents the Mantra of Manjushri and chant it in the dream.

Om ah ra pa tsa na dhi.  

Wisdom ripens all sentient beings. Om 1 2 3 4 5 6

In the dream I know that Li and Be are highly reactive but I do not know much about Boron. Lithium is the basis of many batteries but it is very flammable in metallic form. Lithium is 3 mixed abundance.

I understand in the dream that I need to complete the manufacture of the dice and work on the Manjushri mantra.

Dream ends.

Note in Mo the numbering goes Om 6 5 4 3 2 1

Unprecedented Dreaming

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For me it has been a useful exercise to group these dreams thematically and see the scope and variety of subject matter. Many people are interested in dreams and things like lucid dreaming. There is an attempt to gain scientific credibility for dream studies using instrumentation and the statistical methods of psychology. Taken as a whole the opus of dreams published here and those not yet published may be unprecedented, and unique. Who else dreams of vajras, patents, lamas and hydrogen bonded water clusters?   

Am I simply an anomaly or is there something more significant at work?

In general people seek to promote their own ideas and profile. The not invented here syndrome can be found on all sides. Group mind is very anti anyone or any idea which does not originate in the group. Outsiders are not very welcome especially if they challenge the status quo or question current operational dogma.

I did, religiously, a Toltec dreaming practice daily at least once a day for eight years. I did it on the Victoria line of a morning. If you can do dreaming practice on a crowded rush hour tube you can do it anywhere. The control has to be good. The intent behind this practice is to connect with the dreamer {Soul or reincarnating Jiva} and then to hand over the steering wheel of the earthly vehicle to her. To live life according to the advice given in dreams, to surrender control.

Subsequent to this I did a meditation called the master in the heart which has a similar purpose, of connection. It builds the Antahkarana, a rāja yoga. One could say that Toltec dreaming draws inspiration down and the yoga builds upwards. They are rose and lotus visualisations. Union or at-one-ment are the goals or aim if you like. It does not require wearing tight leggings or looking fit / hot. It does mean that some measure of letting go of imagined control is needed.

Because I am good at visualisation, I have extended the rāja yoga to “places” beyond any written account. In Toltec terms a steady pictorial visualisation is an active dream in which you imagine and hold fast an image. These dream thought forms tend to stabilize when they are “accurate” and reproducible.  For example, the Sahasrāra chakra or crown chakra is one such visualisation. Opening this chakra and going beyond it is a death practice in which one opens the exit door. In order to do this one needs to stretch the sūtrātman anchoring the life inside the body. It is a risky thing to do, control must be impeccable. I first did this in a detached house in the middle of a wood on a country estate a distance from interruption and people. During the day I was quite alone in a “cabin” in a wood.

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Because I am a scientist by training and I used to train smart young things in science at a top university and at high school sixth form levels. I even had postdoctoral workers. I have kept lab books or dream journals. The rāja yoga or active dream meditations were extensive with some of the thought forms taking weeks and months to build.  What one experiences in passing to a “higher” more “rarefied” state of consciousness is a kind of “membrane” which has to be transcended / popped. Each new state is difficult to hold or stabilize. Yet with practice it can be done. Here is one page from my dream journal.

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In these meditations slight residual corporeal awareness remains but all sense of earth-time vanishes. There is a distant awareness of the room. One continues breathing but unconsciously so. I did record electroencephalograms {EEG} and video for a few of these. The EEG is, aside from very low frequency and amplitude theta, essentially flat despite the visualisation.

These meditations have a sensation of extensive travel to non-mundane “levels” “states” or “places”.

There is no way that I could adequately convey the experience to others. Unless you have “gone” there yourself you cannot know. Of particular assistance was the mantra associated with the Heart Sutra which one can chant in order to change between states when working upwards.

Gate gate, para gate, para sum gate bodhi svaha

Gone gone, gone beyond, gone beyond the beyond, hail the awakening

I was in conscious control doing this during daylight and without drugs or booze.

One needs to take great care to come back “down” and into body consciousness. At first the “path” downwards is as slow as the “upward”. In time one knows the way “home” and this can be done more quickly.

I guess these meditations are a form of white tantra. They are situated at anja and above and have nothing to do with basal tantra. In some later meditations three centres are active, heart, anja and sahasrāra.

In my book active visualisation and 3d {sometimes +} thought form building is active dreaming.

Of course I could be kidding myself, but I somehow doubt that.

This is what I mean by dreamyoga…

Buddha Pronounces the Sūtra of the Total Annihilation of the Dharma

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This prompted by my dream see previous post.

Translated from Sanskrit into Chinese

by

An Unknown Person

Thus I have heard:

    At one time the Buddha, together with bhikṣus and Bodhisattvas, was staying in the city kingdom of Kuśinagara, where He would enter parinirvāṇa in three months. Countless multitudes came to the Buddha and bowed their heads down to the ground. Surrounded by His devotees longing to hear the Dharma, the World-Honored One remained silent, and His radiance did not manifest.

    The venerable Ānanda made obeisance to the Buddha and asked Him, “When the World-Honored One pronounces the Dharma, His awesome radiance is always displayed before and after. Now in this huge assembly, His radiance does not appear. Why is this so? There must be a reason. I pray to hear its implication.”

    The Buddha remained silent, not responding. After Ānanda asked this question for the third time, the Buddha told Ānanda, “After my parinirvāṇa, as the Dharma comes to an end, the way of the māras will thrive in this world of the five turbidities. Māras will appear as śramaṇas so as to undermine and destroy my Way. They will wear lay clothes and delight in the monk’s robe dyed with a mixture of five colors. To gratify ravenous appetites, they will drink alcohol, eat flesh, and kill sentient beings. Devoid of lovingkindness, they will hate and envy others.

    “At that time, there will be Bodhisattvas, Pratyekabuddhas, and Arhats, who energetically cultivate virtue and treat all with respect. Esteemed by all, they will teach and transform others impartially. They will pity the poor and old, and help the needy and unfortunate. They will teach others to revere and uphold the sūtras and the holy images. Kind and benevolent in nature, they will do meritorious karmas. Never harming others, they will disregard any harm to themselves in order to help others. Kind and friendly, they will endure abuse, not protecting themselves.

    “Although there will be such good people, all māra bhikṣus will be jealous of them. They will slander, malign, and banish them. Afterward, individually and as a group, the māra bhikṣus will not cultivate virtue. Temples will be deserted, falling into disrepair then into ruins. Greedy for material wealth, they will accumulate things, not using them to acquire merit. They will sell slaves to work in the fields. Devoid of lovingkindness, they will burn mountain forests, harming sentient beings. Male slaves will become bhikṣus, and female slaves will become bhikṣuṇīs. Devoid of morality, they will engage in sexual debauchery and perversion, whether with men or women. Such people will cause my Way to fade away.

    “Some of them will seek sanctuary in my Order to escape prosecution by the law. They will become śramaṇas but will not observe the precepts or regulations. Although they will, in appearance, recite the precepts on new-moon and full-moon days, they will be reluctant and indolent, not wanting to hear the recitation. They will omit some precepts, not wanting to recite all of them. They will not recite or study the sūtras. If there are readers who do not know the words [in the sūtras], they will claim that they know them. They will not consult the learned ones, but will instead seek fame for self-elevation. They will glorify themselves with fake elegant ways, expecting offerings from others. For committing any of the five rebellious sins, after death, these māra bhikṣus will fall into the hell of uninterrupted suffering. They will then be reborn as animals or hungry ghosts for as many kalpas as the sands of the Ganges. After their sins have been purged, they will be reborn [as humans] in a fringe country where the Three Jewels will not be accessible.

    “When the Dharma is ending, women will diligently do meritorious karmas while men will be indolent and arrogant. Men, having no faith, will not use the words in the Dharma, but will regard śramaṇas as feces and dirt. When the Dharma is ending, gods will shed tears. Flood and drought will ravage, and five kinds of grain will not ripen. Epidemics will be prevalent and many will die. People will endure a hard life, and government officials will exploit them. People will not follow good principles, thinking only of pleasure and strife. The evil ones will become as numerous as the sands in the sea. The good ones will decrease to one or two. As a kalpa is ending, the sun and the moon will be unstable and human lifespan will shorten. At the age of 40, one’s hair will turn white. Men indulging in sexual acts may die prematurely from depletion of their semen, or may live to only 60. While men will live short lives, women will live long to 70, 80, 90, or even 100 years. Faithless people will say that the situation can be permanent.

    “A massive flood will suddenly rise, lasting endlessly. Various species of sentient beings, lofty or lowly, will drown or drift in the waters, and they will be eaten by fish and other sea creatures. Bodhisattvas, Pratyekabuddhas, and Arhats, driven away by the māras, will not convene. [These holy beings of] the Three Vehicles will enter the meritorious grounds in the mountains. There they will live a long life, tranquilly biding their time. They will meet with one another when the god-kings escort Moonlight Bodhisattva to appear in the world. Together they will revitalize my Dharma for fifty-two years.

    “Then the Śūraṅgama Sūtra and the Pratyutpanna Buddha Sammukhāvasthita Samādhi Sūtra will be destroyed, to be followed by all other sūtras in the twelve categories. Their words will not be seen again. The monk’s robe will naturally turn white. When my Dharma perishes, it will be like [the flame of] an oil lamp. When it is dying, its light becomes brighter for a while then dies out. When my Dharma perishes, it will be like the extinction of a lamp. What will happen afterward is hard to describe. Eventually, after tens of millions of years, Maitreya Bodhisattva will descend to this world to become a Buddha. All toxic gases will then be eliminated, and the world will be safe and peaceful. The rains will be harmonious and the five grains will thrive. The trees will be tall, and humans will each be eighty feet tall, with a lifespan of 84,000 years. Innumerable sentient beings will be delivered.”

    The venerable Ānanda made obeisance to the Buddha and asked Him, “What should we call this sūtra? How should we uphold it?”

    The Buddha replied, “Ānanda, this sūtra is called Total Annihilation of the Dharma. Pronounce it to all and let them know its significance. Your merit will be immeasurable, beyond reckoning.”

    The four groups of disciples, having heard this sūtra, were distressed and downcast, but they all activated their resolve to attain the unsurpassed bodhi. Then they made obeisance to the Buddha and departed.