Abduh was imbued with a liberal spirit. Symptomatic of his tolerance of non-Sunni Muslims is his interpretation of a hadith in which Muhammad prophesized that, after his death, the Muslim community would be divided into seventy-three sects of which only one would be saved. Abduh argued that no Muslim could be sure of belonging to the saved sect and that, in any case, it is quite possible that all surviving sects belong to that group. In contrast, Rida was much less tolerant of the other. In one of his few direct criticisms of ‘Abduh, Rida rejected the Imam’s reading of the hadith alluded to above, stating unequivocally that the “saved sect” was "Ahlul Sunna wal Jama'ah ("I.e Sunni Islam).