troubling the people with a stench even more offensive than during their lifetime. So they will implore Allah, Exalted be He, and Allah will send a dusty south-westerly wind from Yemen that will envelop the people in gloom and smoke, afflicting them with catarrh. Three days later the affliction will be lifted and their corpses will have been cast into the sea. Only a short while will pass before the sun rises from the west; at that moment the pens will cease to write, the scrolls will be folded up, and no one’s repentance will any longer be accepted.

Iblis will then fall down in prostration, crying, “My Lord, command me to prostrate to whomever You will.” The devils will gather round him, saying, “Our master, to whom do you now flee?” He will reply, “I asked my Lord to grant me respite until the Day of Resurrection, and now the sun has risen from the west—this is the appointed time.” The devils will then roam openly upon the earth, to the point that a man will say, “This is the companion who used to mislead me—praise be to Allah who has disgraced him.” Iblis will remain prostrate, weeping, until the Beast emerges and kills him while he is still in prostration.

Thereafter the believers will enjoy forty years; whatever they wish for will be granted to them, and no believer will die until the forty years after the Beast have elapsed. Then death will return among them, spreading swiftly until no believer remains.

The disbeliever will say, “We used to live in fear of the believers, but not one of them is left and repentance is no longer accepted from us.” They will then couple in the streets like cattle, until a man has intercourse with his own mother in the middle of the road; as soon as one man rises from her, another will mount her. The best among them will be the one who merely says, “Would you not step off the road? That would be better.” They will continue in that state until no child is born from lawful marriage. Allah will then render women barren for thirty years, except for the fornicators, for the adulteresses will conceive and give birth through fornication; all of them will be children of adultery, the worst of people, and upon them the Hour will come.

This was narrated by al-Tabarani from ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Hatim al-Muradi, from Nuʿaym ibn Hammad … and so he related it.

Our teacher, the hadith scholar al-Dhahabi, said: “This hadith is virtually fabricated. Abu ʿUmar is unknown, and so is ʿAbd al-Wahhab; his shaykh is said to be al-Bunani (1).”

Our teacher al-Dhahabi also informed me by authorization—if not by direct audition—[that] Abu al-Husayn al-Yunini informed us, al-Bahaʾ ʿAbd al-Rahman narrated to us in person, ʿAtiq ibn Sayla narrated to us, ʿAbd al-Wahid ibn ʿAlwan narrated to us, Abu ʿAmr ibn Dawst narrated to us, Ahmad ibn Salman al-Najjād narrated to us, Muhammad ibn Ghabi narrated to us, Abu Salama al-Tabudhaki narrated to us, Hammad ibn Salama narrated to us, ʿAli ibn Zayd narrated from al-Hasan, who said:

“The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: ‘The Dajjal will reach up to the clouds, will wade in the sea up to his knees, will outstrip the sun to its setting place, and the hills will travel with him as provisions. On his forehead will be a horn with a broken tip from which serpents will emerge. Depicted upon his body will be every kind of weapon—even the spear, the sword, and the dirqa.’ I said to al-Hasan, ‘Abu Saʿid, what is a dirqa?’ He replied, ‘A shield.’

Our teacher then said: ‘This is one of al-Hasan’s mursal reports, and they are weak.’

Ibn Mandah said in his Book of Faith: ‘Muhammad ibn al-Husayn al-Madini narrated to us, Ahmad ibn Mahdi narrated to us…’