2165 — “If a stone were thrown into Hell, it would fall for seventy years before reaching its bottom.”

Abū Yaʿlā (4/1739), al-Bazzār (315), and Ibn Ḥibbān (2609) narrated it through Jarīr ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd, from ʿAṭāʾ ibn al-Sāʾib, from Abū Bakr ibn Abī Mūsā al-Ashʿarī, from Abū Mūsā al-Ashʿarī, as a report attributed to the Prophet.

I say: All the narrators in this chain are trustworthy and are among the narrators relied upon by the two Shaykhs, except for ʿAṭāʾ ibn al-Sāʾib, who is among al-Bukhārī’s narrators alone. He became confused in his later years, yet al-Ḥāfiẓ said in Zawāʾid al-Bazzār: “Its chain is good.” Al-Haythamī, however, attributed it in al-Majmaʿ (10/389) to al-Bazzār and al-Ṭabarānī, without mentioning Abū Yaʿlā, then declared it defective because of Muḥammad ibn Abān—although no such narrator occurs in their chain.

Yet the hadith has supporting reports indicating that it was accurately preserved:

The first is from Abū Hurayrah, who said: “By Him in Whose Hand is Abū Hurayrah’s soul, the depth of Hell is seventy years.” Muslim recorded it in his Ṣaḥīḥ (1/130). It is a report attributed to a Companion, but it has the ruling of one attributed to the Prophet. It was also narrated from him as a report attributed to the Prophet, through Abū Ḥāzim from him. He said: “We were with the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, when he heard a crashing sound. He said, ‘Do you know what this is?’ We said, ‘Allah and His Messenger know best.’ He said, ‘This is a stone that was cast into the Fire seventy years ago, and it has been falling through the Fire until it has now reached its bottom.’”

Muslim (8/150) and Aḥmad (2/371) recorded it. Al-Ḥākim (4/606) also recorded it through ʿUqbah ibn Abī al-Ḥasnāʾ, from Abū Hurayrah, as a report attributed to the Prophet, with the wording: