them both—through sound chains of transmission—and that al-Tabarī (1) authenticated this basic premise and supported it with reports.

Al-Suyūtī then explained that the Prophet’s statement—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—“and I am in its final millennium” means that the greater part of this religious community’s lifespan falls within the seventh millennium. This accords with what will follow, namely, that he was sent near the end of the sixth millennium. Had he been sent at the beginning of the seventh millennium, the major signs—such as the Dajjāl, the descent of Jesus, peace be upon him, and the sun rising from the west—would have occurred more than a hundred years before today, so that the Hour could take place upon the completion of the millennium. Yet none of these things had occurred. This indicated that more than three hundred years of the seventh millennium remained (2).

This is a summary of al-Suyūtī’s argument—may Allah have mercy on him—but it directly contradicts the explicit teaching of the Quran and the authentic hadiths: no one knows the duration of this world except Allah Most High. If we knew how long the world would last, we would know when the Hour would occur. You have already learned from the preceding Quranic verses and Prophetic hadiths that no one except Allah Most High knows when the Hour will occur.

Moreover, reality refutes this claim. We are now at the beginning of the fifteenth Hijri century, yet the Dajjāl has not emerged and Jesus, peace be upon him, has not descended. Al-Suyūtī mentioned that it had been reported that the Dajjāl would emerge at the turn of a century; that Jesus, peace be upon him, would descend, kill him, and then remain on earth for forty years; that people would remain for one hundred and twenty years after the sun rises from the west; and that the interval between the two blasts of the Trumpet would be forty years. These periods, then,