Commenting on a Ĥadīth that ends with: ‘The time that is left for this world is just as much as that has passed as of this day’ [Abū Dāwūd:4240], Hafiz Ibn Kathīr says: Áli ibn Zayd ibn Ĥadjān at-Taymi [one of the narrators in the above hadith] is known for strange and repudiated [gharāyib, munkarāt] reports but yet, there are reports that have some similarity to this ĥadīth. There is a narration through Abū Nuşrah from Abū Saýid: [a part of the above, which proves that it is an interrupted chain] "What is left from the age of this world compared to what has already passed is very little." Inspite of this, no one knows the age or its span specifically except Allāh, the Most Exalted. There is no basis for the Jewish traditions [Israyīliyāt] that specify the duration of this world from that which has passed and that which is left. Even as no one except Allāh knows the age of this world, [no one knows] that which remains of it. As for the reports found in Judeo-Christian traditions that mention ‘thousands’ and ‘hundreds’ of years, many [Islamic] scholars have written on the foolishness of such floundering claims and the mistake in making them. There is a ĥadīth that says: ‘This world is like a week, from the weeks of the hereafter’ [Ţabari in Tārikh 1/10; the word used is Jumuáh which is translated as ‘week’]. The chain of narration of this ĥadīth is not an authentic one either, just like that of any ĥadīth that designates a specific time for the Judgement day. [An-Nihāyah fi’l Fitani wa’l Malāĥim, Ibn Kathīr, vol.1, pg23]
