Muqatil said: They will say in the Fire, “Come, let us give way to impatience.” So they will be impatient for five hundred years, but their impatience will not benefit them. Then they will say, “Come, let us be patient.” So they will remain patient for five hundred years, but it will not benefit them. At that point they will say: “It is all the same for us whether we are impatient or patient: there is no escape for us.” (1)

Muhammad ibn Ka‘b al-Qurazi (2) said: It has reached me that the people of the Fire will appeal for help to its keepers. Allah, Exalted is He, says: “And those in the Fire will say to the keepers of Hell, ‘Call upon your Lord to lighten for us one day of the punishment.’” (Ghafir 49) The keepers will reply to them, “Did your messengers not come to you with clear proofs?” They will say, “Indeed, they did.” The keepers will then reply to them: “Then call; but the supplication of the disbelievers is only in error.” (Ghafir 50)

When they despair of receiving anything from the keepers, they will call out: “O Malik, let your Lord put an end to us!” (al-Zukhruf 77) They will ask for death, but he will not answer them for eighty years—each year consisting of three hundred and sixty days, and each day being like a thousand years by your reckoning. Then, after the eighty years, he will look toward them and say, “Indeed, you shall remain.”

When they despair after this, some of them will say to others: “The affliction that you see has befallen you, so come, let us be patient. Perhaps patience will benefit us, just as the people of the world were patient in obeying Allah and it benefited them.” Thus, they will agree to be patient. Their patience will endure for a long time; then they will give way to impatience and call out: “It is all the same for us whether we are impatient or patient: there is no escape for us”—that is, no deliverance.

He said: Then Iblis will rise among them and address them, saying: “Indeed, Allah promised you the promise of truth”—the verse. When they hear his words, they will loathe themselves, and it will be proclaimed to them: “Allah’s loathing of you is greater than your loathing of yourselves when you were called to faith and yet disbelieved.” (Ghafir 10)

Then, for the second time, they will call out: “Send us back, and we will do righteous deeds; indeed, we are now certain.” He will reply to them: “Had We willed, We could have given every soul its guidance”—the verses. (al-Sajdah 12, 13)

For the third time, they will call out: “Our Lord, delay us for a short term; we will answer Your call and follow the messengers.” (Ibrahim 44) He will reply to them: “Did you not swear before that there would be no end for you?”—the verses. (Ibrahim 44)

Then, for the fourth time, they will call out: “Our Lord, bring us out of it, and we will do righteous deeds other than those we used to do.” He will reply to them: “Did We not grant you lives long enough for whoever would take heed to take heed therein, and did the warner not come to you?”—the verse. (Fatir 37)

He said: Then He will leave them for as long as Allah wills, after which He will call to them: “Were My verses not recited to you, and did you not deny them?” When they hear this, they will say, “Now He will have mercy upon us.” So they will say at that point: “Our Lord, our wretchedness overcame us, and we were a people astray. Our Lord, bring us out of it; if we return, then indeed we shall be wrongdoers.” He will then say: “Remain despised therein, and do not speak to Me.” (al-Mu’minun 105–108)

At that point, all hope and supplication will cease for them. They will turn upon one another, barking in one another’s faces, and the Fire will be sealed over them.