He then said (1): Ibn Masʿūd declared, “A time will surely come upon Jahannam when its gates will rattle for lack of anyone inside; that will be after they have remained there for many ages (aḥqāb).” (2)
He also related that Muḥammad ibn Ḥumayd al-Rāzī narrated to us (3), Jarīr narrated to us, from Bayān (4), from al-Shaʿbī, who said, “Jahannam is the quicker of the two abodes to be inhabited and the quicker of them to become desolate.” (5)
Ḥarb al-Kirmānī reported—through Isḥāq ibn Rāhawayh, then ʿUbaydallāh ibn Muʿādh, his father, and Shuʿbah—from Abū Balj, who heard ʿAmr ibn Maymūn relate from ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿAmr—that he said, “A day will surely come upon Jahannam when its doors will clap shut and no one will remain inside.” (6) That will be after they have stayed there for countless ages.
(1) The author is Ibn Jarir al-Tabari.
(2) The same source as above.
(3) In the margin of the original text appears: “It was discussed by Muhammad ibn Humayd al-Razza’i, and Ibn Jarir al-Tabari cites it frequently in his own wording.” Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani summarized his status as “hafiz but weak” (Taqrib al-Tahdhib, 2:156).
(4) In the margin of the original appears: “Assessment: trustworthy; it appears in the two Sahih collections.” This refers to Ibn Bushr al-Ahmasi, deemed reliable and narrated by the community; see Taqrib al-Tahdhib, entry 789.
(5) It was recorded by Ibn Jarir in his Tafsir al-Jami‘ bayān al-Qur’an, 13:118, and by al-Suyuti in ad-Durr al-Manthur, 4:478.
(6) Al-Dhahabi included this report in Mizan al-I’tidal under the biography of Abu Balj al-Azzazi, regarding it as one of its defects and declaring it munkar (rejected) (Mizan al-I’tidal, 4:384). See also al-Albani’s Silsilat al-Ahadith al-Daifa wa al-Mawdu'a, 2:72.