were hurled into Hell, it would plunge for seventy autumns before it reached the very bottom." (1)

Another narration:
Al-Tirmidhī, al-Nasā’ī, al-Bayhaqī, and the ḥāfiẓ Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣbahānī—whose wording we are citing—transmitted it through the chain of ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Mubārak: ʿAnbasah narrated to us, from Ḥabīb ibn Abī ʿAmrah, from Mujāhid, from Ibn ʿAbbās, who said:

“Do you know how vast Hell is?” We answered, “No.” He said, “Indeed, by Allah, you do not know. The distance between the lobe of one of its inhabitants’ ears and his shoulder is a journey of seventy autumns, and in that space valleys of pus and blood flow.”

We asked, “Rivers?” He replied, “No—valleys.”

Then he asked again, “Do you know how vast Hell is?” We said, “No.” He said, “Indeed, by Allah, you do not know. ʿĀʾishah told me that she asked the Prophet ﷺ about Allah’s statement: ‘The whole earth will be in His grasp on the Day of Resurrection, and the heavens will be rolled up in His right hand’ (al-Zumar 39:67). She asked, ‘Where will the people be that Day?’ He replied, ‘On the bridge over Hell.’”

Only the portion raised to the Prophet (marfūʿ) was recorded by al-Tirmidhī and al-Nasā’ī, and al-Tirmidhī said, “Sound yet rare through this route.” (2)

It is also authentically recorded in Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, through al-ʿAlāʾ ibn Khālid, from Abū Wāʾil Shaqīq ibn Salamah, from Ibn Masʿūd—raised to the Prophet ﷺ: “Hell will be brought forth, led by seventy thousand reins; with every rein are seventy thousand angels pulling it.” (3)
It has likewise been transmitted as a mawqūf report from Ibn Masʿūd—Allah be pleased with him—and Allah knows best. (4)

A further narration comes from ʿAlī ibn Mūsā al-Riḍā, from his forefathers [from ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib—Allah be pleased with him], raised to the Prophet ﷺ:

“Do you know the explanation of the verse, ‘No indeed! When the earth is crushed, crushed completely; and your Lord comes with the angels, rank upon rank, and Hell is brought that Day…’ (al-Fajr 89:21-23)?”

He said, “On the Day of Resurrection Hell will be drawn with seventy thousand reins; each rein will be held by seventy thousand angels.” He added, “Then it will surge forward; were it not that Allah restrains it, it would burn up the heavens and the earth.” (5)

Aḥmad said: ʿAlī ibn Isḥāq narrated to us; ʿAbd Allāh narrated to us; Saʿīd ibn Yazīd narrated to us; Abū al-Samh narrated to us, from ʿĪsā ibn Hilāl al-Ṣadafī, from ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAmr, who said: The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, “If a lead pellet the size of this”—and he pointed to a skull—“were dropped from the sky to the earth, a distance of five hundred years’ travel, it would reach…”