After the death of Abduh, Rida went to great lengths to claim his mantle. His biography of ‘Abduh contains several instances in which the Imam seems to designate Rida as his successor. And he did not hesitate to invoke his mentor’s authority when he needed to prop his arguments, even when it seems rather unlikely that ‘Abduh would have shared his views. After the Imam’s death, his former pupils had divided into two opposing camps. On one side was the "al-Manar Party" – or "the Reform Party" (Hizb al-islam), as Rida called it – which insisted on the relevance of Islam for the organization of society and the state. On the other side were the secular-minded politicians and intellectuals like Said Zaghlul, the liberal leader of Egyptian independence, or ‘Ali ‘Abd al-Raziq, an Azhari graduate who in his "Islam wa-usul al-hukm" argued that Islam was a spiritual religion without political content. Rida’s fierce campaign against Abd al-Raziq was instrumental in bringing him to trial for his “attack” on Islam and his subsequent “defrocking.”