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Wali

A wali (وَلِيّ; plural أَوْلِيَاء, ) is most commonly used by Muslims to indicate a saint, otherwise referred to by the more literal "friend of God".

When the Arabic definite article al (ال) is added, it refers to one of the names of God in Islam, Allah – al-Walī (الْوليّ), meaning "the Helper, Friend".

In the traditional Islamic understanding, a saint is portrayed as someone "marked by [special] divine favor ... [and] holiness", and who is specifically "chosen by God and endowed with exceptional gifts, such as the ability to work miracles". The doctrine of saints was articulated by Muslim scholars very early on in Islamic history,  and particular verses of the Quran and certain hadith were interpreted by early Muslim thinkers as "documentary evidence" of the existence of saints. Graves of saints around the Muslim world became centers of pilgrimage – especially after 1200 CE – for masses of Muslims seeking their barakah (blessing).

Since the first Muslim hagiographies were written during the period when the Islamic mystical trend of Sufism began its rapid expansion, many of the figures who later came to be regarded as the major saints in orthodox Sunni Islam were the early Sufi mystics, like Hasan of Basra (d. 728), Farqad Sabakhi (d. 729), Dawud Tai (d. 777–781), Rabia of Basra (d. 801), Maruf Karkhi (d. 815), and Junayd of Baghdad (d. 910). From the twelfth to the fourteenth century, "the general veneration of saints, among both people and sovereigns, reached its definitive form with the organization of Sufism ... into orders or brotherhoods". In the common expressions of Islamic piety of this period, the saint was understood to be "a contemplative whose state of spiritual perfection ... [found] permanent expression in the teaching bequeathed to his disciples". In many prominent Sunni creeds of the time, such as the famous Creed of Tahawi (c. 900) and the Creed of Nasafi (c. 1000), a belief in the existence and miracles of saints was presented as "a requirement" for being an orthodox Muslim believer.

Aside from the Sufis, the preeminent saints in traditional Islamic piety are the Companions of the Prophet, their Successors, and the Successors of the Successors. Additionally, the prophets and messengers in Islam are also believed to be saints by definition, although they are rarely referred to as such, in order to prevent confusion between them and ordinary saints; as the prophets are exalted by Muslims as the greatest of all humanity, it is a general tenet of Sunni belief that a single prophet is greater than all the regular saints put together. In short, it is believed that "every prophet is a saint, but not every saint is a prophet".

In the modern world, traditional Sunni and Shia ideas of saints has been challenged by fundamentalist and revivalist Islamic movements such as the Salafi movement, Wahhabism, and Islamic Modernism, all three of which have, to a greater or lesser degree, "formed a front against the veneration and theory of saints". As has been noted by scholars, the development of these movements has indirectly led to a trend amongst some mainstream Muslims to resist "acknowledging the existence of Muslim saints altogether or ... [to view] their presence and veneration as unacceptable deviations". However, despite the presence of these opposing streams of thought, the classical doctrine of saint veneration continues to thrive in many parts of the Islamic world today, playing a vital role in daily expressions of piety among vast segments of Muslim populations in Muslim countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh, Egypt, Turkey, Senegal, Iraq, Iran, Algeria, Tunisia, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Morocco, as well as in countries with substantial Islamic populations like India, China, Russia, and the Balkans.

Names
Regarding the rendering of the Arabic walī by the English "saint", prominent scholars such as Gibril Haddad have regarded this as an appropriate translation, with Haddad describing the aversion of some Muslims towards the use of "saint" for walī as "a specious objection ... for [this is] – like 'Religion' (din), 'Believer' (mu'min), 'prayer' (salat), etc. – [a] generic term for holiness and holy persons while there is no confusion, for Muslims, over their specific referents in Islam, namely: the reality of iman with Godwariness and those who possess those qualities." In Persian, which became the second most influential and widely spoken language in the Islamic world after Arabic, the general title for a saint or a spiritual master became pīr (, literally "old [person]", "elder" ). Although the ramifications of this phrase include the connotations of a general "saint," it is often used to specifically signify a spiritual guide of some type.

Amongst Indian Muslims, the title pīr baba (पीर बाबा) is commonly used in Hindi to refer to Sufi masters or similarly honored saints. Additionally, saints are also sometimes referred to in the Persian or Urdu vernacular with "Hazrat." In Islamic mysticism, a pīr's role is to guide and instruct his disciples on the mystical path. Hence, the key difference between the use of walī and pīr is that the former does not imply a saint who is also a spiritual master with disciples, while the latter directly does so through its connotations of "elder". Additionally, other Arabic and Persian words that also often have the same connotations as pīr, and hence are also sometimes translated into English as "saint", include murshid (مرشد, meaning "guide" or "teacher"), sheikh and sarkar (Persian word meaning "master").

In the Turkish Islamic lands, saints have been referred to by many terms, including the Arabic walī, the Persian s̲h̲āh and pīr, and Turkish alternatives like baba in Anatolia, ata in Central Asia (both meaning "father"), and eren or ermis̲h̲ (< ermek "to reach, attain") or yati̊r ("one who settles down") in Anatolia. Their tombs, meanwhile, are "denoted by terms of Arabic or Persian origin alluding to the idea of pilgrimage (mazār, ziyāratgāh), tomb (ḳabr, maḳbar) or domed mausoleum (gunbad, ḳubba). But such tombs are also denoted by terms usually used for dervish convents, or a particular part of it (tekke in the Balkans, langar, 'refectory,' and ribāṭ in Central Asia), or by a quality of the saint (pīr, 'venerable, respectable,' in Azerbaijan)."

History

According to various traditional Sufi interpretations of the Quran, the concept of sainthood is clearly described. Some modern scholars, however, assert that the Quran does not explicitly outline a doctrine or theory of saints. In the Quran, the adjective walī is applied to God, in the sense of him being the "friend" of all believers (Q). However, particular Quranic verses were interpreted by early Islamic scholars to refer to a special, exalted group of holy people. These included : "Surely God's friends (awliyāa l-lahi): no fear shall be on them, neither shall they sorrow," and, which refers to God's love for those who love him. Additionally, some scholars interpreted, "Whosoever obeys God and the Messenger, they are with those unto whom God hath shown favor: the prophets and the ṣidīqīna and the martyrs and the righteous. The best of company are they," to carry a reference to holy people who were not prophets and were ranked below the latter. The word ṣidīqīna in this verse literally connotes "the truthful ones" or "the just ones," and was often interpreted by the early Islamic thinkers in the sense of "saints," with the famous Quran translator Marmaduke Pickthall rendering it as "saints" in their interpretations of the scripture. Furthermore, the Quran referred to the miracles of saintly people who were not prophets like Khidr and the People of the Cave, which also led many early scholars to deduce that a group of venerable people must exist who occupy a rank below the prophets but are nevertheless exalted by God. The references in the corpus of hadith literature to bona fide saints like the pre-Islamic Jurayj̲,   only lent further credence to this early understanding of saints.

Collected stories about the "lives or vitae of the saints", began to be compiled "and transmitted at an early stage" by many regular Muslim scholars, including Ibn Abi al-Dunya (d. 894), who wrote a work entitled Kitāb al-Awliyāʾ (Lives of the Saints) in the ninth-century, which constitutes "the earliest [complete] compilation on the theme of God's friends." Prior to Ibn Abi al-Dunya's work, the stories of the saints were transmitted through oral tradition; but after the composition of his work, many Islamic scholars began writing down the widely circulated accounts, with later scholars like Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī (d. 948) making extensive use of Ibn Abi al-Dunya's work in his own Ḥilyat al-awliyāʾ (The Adornment of the Saints). It is, moreover, evident from the Kitāb al-Kas̲h̲f wa 'l-bayān of the early Baghdadi Sufi mystic Abu Sa'id al-Kharraz (d. 899) that a cohesive understanding of the Muslim saints was already in existence, with al-Kharraz spending ample space distinguishing between the virtues and miracles (karāmāt) of the prophets and the saints. The genre of hagiography (manāḳib) only became more popular with the passage of time, with numerous prominent Islamic thinkers of the medieval period devoting large works to collecting stories of various saints or to focusing upon "the marvelous aspects of the life, the miracles or at least the prodigies of a [specific] Ṣūfī or of a saint believed to have been endowed with miraculous powers."

In the late ninth-century, important thinkers in Sunni Islam officially articulated the previously-oral doctrine of an entire hierarchy of saints, with the first written account of this hierarchy coming from the pen of al-Hakim al-Tirmidhi (d. 907-912). With the general consensus of Islamic scholars of the period accepting that the ulema were responsible for maintaining the "exoteric" part of Islamic orthodoxy, including the disciplines of law and jurisprudence, while the Sufis were responsible for articulating the religion's deepest inward truths, later prominent mystics like Ibn Arabi (d. 1240) only further reinforced this idea of a saintly hierarchy, and the notion of "types" of saints became a mainstay of Sunni mystical thought, with such types including the ṣiddīqūn ("the truthful ones") and the abdāl ("the substitute-saints"), amongst others. Many of these concepts appear in writing far before al-Tirmidhi and Ibn Arabi; the idea of the abdāl, for example, appears as early as the Musnad of Ibn Hanbal (d. 855), where the word signifies a group of major saints "whose number would remain constant, one always being replaced by some other on his death." It is, in fact, reported that Ibn Hanbal explicitly identified his contemporary, the mystic Maruf Karkhi (d. 815-20), as one of the abdal, saying: "He is one of the substitute-saints, and his supplication is answered."

From the twelfth to the fourteenth century, "the general veneration of saints, among both people and sovereigns, reached its definitive form with the organization of Sufism—the mysticism of Islam—into orders or brotherhoods." In general Islamic piety of the period, the saint was understood to be "a contemplative whose state of spiritual perfection ... [found] permanent expression in the teaching bequeathed to his disciples." It was by virtue of his spiritual wisdom that the saint was accorded veneration in medieval Islam, "and it is this which ... [effected] his 'canonization,' and not some ecclesiastical institution" as in Christianity. In fact, the latter point represents one of the crucial differences between the Islamic and Christian veneration of saints, for saints are venerated by unanimous consensus or popular acclaim in Islam, in a manner akin to all those Christian saints who began to be venerated prior to the institution of canonization. In fact, a belief in the existence of saints became such an important part of medieval Islam  that many of the most important creeds articulated during the time period, like the famous Creed of Tahawi, explicitly declared it a requirement for being an "orthodox" Muslim to believe in the existence and veneration of saints and in the traditional narratives of their lives and miracles. Hence, we find that even medieval critics of the widespread practice of venerating the tombs of saints, like Ibn Taymiyyah (d. 1328), never denied the existence of saints as such, with the Hanbali jurist stating: "The miracles of saints are absolutely true and correct, by the acceptance of all Muslim scholars. And the Qur'an has pointed to it in different places, and the sayings of the Prophet have mentioned it, and whoever denies the miraculous power of saints are only people who are innovators and their followers." In the words of one contemporary academic, practically all Muslims of that era believed that "the lives of saints and their miracles were incontestable."

In the modern world, the traditional idea of saints in Islam has been challenged by the puritanical and revivalist Islamic movements of Salafism and Wahhabism, whose influence has "formed a front against the veneration and theory of saints." For the adherents of Wahhabi ideology, for example, the practice of venerating saints appears as an "abomination", for they see in this a form of idolatry. It is for this reason that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which adheres to the Wahhabi creed, "destroyed the tombs of saints wherever ... able" during its expansion in the Arabian Peninsula from the eighteenth-century onwards. As has been noted by scholars, the development of these movements have indirectly led to a trend amongst some mainstream Muslims to also resist "acknowledging the existence of Muslim saints altogether or ... [to view] their presence and veneration as unacceptable deviations." At the same time, the movement of Islamic Modernism has also opposed the traditional veneration of saints, for many proponents of this ideology regard the practice as "being both un-Islamic and backwards ... rather than the integral part of Islam which they were for over a millennium." Despite the presence, however, of these opposing streams of thought, the classical doctrine of saint-veneration continues to thrive in many parts of the Islamic world today, playing a vital part in the daily piety of vast portions of Muslim countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh, Egypt, Turkey, Senegal, Iraq, Iran, Algeria, Tunisia, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Morocco, as well as in countries with substantive Islamic populations like India, China, Russia, and the Balkans.

Definitions
The general definition of the Muslim saint in classical texts is that he represents a "[friend of God] marked by [special] divine favor ... [and] holiness", being specifically "chosen by God and endowed with exceptional gifts, such as the ability to work miracles." Moreover, the saint is also portrayed in traditional hagiographies as one who "in some way ... acquires his Friend's, i.e. God's, good qualities, and therefore he possesses particular authority, forces, capacities and abilities." Amongst classical scholars, Qushayri (d. 1073) defined the saint as someone "whose obedience attains permanence without interference of sin; whom God preserves and guards, in permanent fashion, from the failures of sin through the power of acts of obedience." Elsewhere, the same author quoted an older tradition in order to convey his understanding of the purpose of saints, which states: "The saints of God are those who, when they are seen, God is remembered."

Meanwhile, al-Hakim al-Tirmidhi (d. 869), the most significant ninth-century expositor of the doctrine, posited six common attributes of true saints (not necessarily applicable to all, according to the author, but nevertheless indicative of a significant portion of them), which are: (1) when people see him, they are automatically reminded of God; (2) anyone who advances towards him in a hostile way is destroyed; (3) he possesses the gift of clairvoyance (firāsa); (4) he receives divine inspiration (ilhām), to be strictly distinguished from revelation proper (waḥy),  with the latter being something only the prophets receive; (5) he can work miracles (karāmāt) by the leave of God, which may differ from saint to saint, but may include marvels such as walking on water (al-mas̲h̲y ʿalā 'l-māʾ) and shortening space and time (ṭayy al-arḍ); and (6) he associates with Khidr. Al-Tirmidhi states, furthermore, that although the saint is not sinless like the prophets, he or she can nevertheless be "preserved from sin" (maḥfūz) by the grace of God. The contemporary scholar of Sufism Martin Lings described the Islamic saints as "the great incarnations of the Islamic ideal.... spiritual giants with which almost every generation was blessed."

Classical testimonies
The doctrine of saints, and of their miracles, seems to have been taken for granted by many of the major authors of the Islamic Golden Age (ca. 700–1400), as well as by many prominent late-medieval scholars. The phenomena in traditional Islam can be at least partly ascribed to the writings of many of the most prominent Sunni theologians and doctors of the classical and medieval periods, many of whom considered the belief in saints to be "orthodox" doctrine. Examples of classical testimonies include:

 * "God has saints (awliyā) whom He has specially distinguished by His friendship and whom He has chosen to be the governors of His kingdom… He has made the saints governors of the universe… Through the blessing of their advent the rain falls from heaven, and through the purity of their lives the plants spring up from the earth, and through their spiritual influence the Muslims gain victories over the truth concealers" (Hujwiri [d. 1072-7]; Sunni Hanafi jurist and mystic)
 * "The miracles of the saints (awliyā) are a reality. The miracle appears on behalf of the saint by way of contradicting the customary way of things.... And such a thing is reckoned as an evidentiary miracle on behalf of the Messenger to one of whose people this act appears, because it is evident from it that he is a saint, and he could never be a saint unless he were right in his religion; and his religion is the confession of the message of the Messenger" (al-Nasafī [d. 1142], Creed XV; Sunni Hanafi theologian)
 * "The miracles of saints are absolutely true and correct, and acknowledged by all Muslim scholars. The Qur'an has pointed to it in different places, and the Hadith of the Prophet have mentioned it, and whoever denies the miraculous power of saints are innovators or following innovators" (Ibn Taymiyya [d. 1328], Mukhtasar al-Fatawa al-Masriyya; Sunni Hanbali theologian and jurisconsult)

Seeking of blessings
The rationale for veneration of deceased saints by pilgrims in an appeal for blessings (Barakah) even though the saints will not rise from the dead until the Day of Resurrection (Yawm ad-Dīn) may come from the hadith that states "the Prophets are alive in their graves and they pray". (According to the Islamic concept of Punishment of the Grave—established by hadith—the dead are still conscious and active, with the wicked suffering in their graves as a prelude to hell and the pious at ease.) According to Islamic historian Jonathan A.C. Brown, "saints are thought to be no different" than prophets, "as able in death to answer invocations for assistance" as they were while alive.

Types and hierarchy
Saints were envisaged to be of different "types" in classical Islamic tradition. Aside from their earthly differences as regard their temporal duty (i.e. jurist, hadith scholar, judge, traditionist, historian, ascetic, poet), saints were also distinguished cosmologically as regards their celestial function or standing. In Islam, however, the saints are represented in traditional texts as serving separate celestial functions, in a manner similar to the angels, and this is closely linked to the idea of a celestial hierarchy in which the various types of saints play different roles. A fundamental distinction was described in the ninth century by al-Tirmidhi in his Sīrat al-awliyāʾ (Lives of the Saints), who distinguished between two principal varieties of saints: the walī ḥaḳḳ Allāh on the one hand and the walī Allāh on the other. According to the author, "the [spiritual] ascent of the walī ḥaḳḳ Allāh must stop at the end of the created cosmos ... he can attain God's proximity, but not God Himself; he is only admitted to God's proximity (muḳarrab). It is the walī Allāh who reaches God. Ascent beyond God's throne means to traverse consciously the realms of light of the Divine Names.... When the walī Allāh has traversed all the realms of the Divine Names, i.e. has come to know God in His names as completely as possible, he is then extinguished in God's essence. His soul, his ego, is eliminated and ... when he acts, it is God Who acts through him. And so the state of extinction means at the same time the highest degree of activity in this world."

Although the doctrine of the hierarchy of saints is already found in written sources as early as the eighth-century, it was al-Tirmidhi who gave it its first systematic articulation. According to the author, forty major saints, whom he refers to by the various names of ṣiddīḳīn, abdāl, umanāʾ, and nuṣaḥāʾ, were appointed after the death of Muhammad to perpetuate the knowledge of the divine mysteries vouchsafed to them by the prophet. These forty saints, al-Tirmidhi stated, would be replaced in each generation after their earthly death; and, according to him, "the fact that they exist is a guarantee for the continuing existence of the world." Among these forty, al-Tirmidhi specified that seven of them were especially blessed. Despite their exalted nature, however, al-Tirmidhi emphasized that these forty saints occupied a rank below the prophets. Later important works which detailed the hierarchy of saints were composed by the mystic ʿAmmār al-Bidlīsī (d. between 1194 and 1207), the spiritual teacher of Najmuddin Kubra (d. 1220), and by Ruzbihan Baqli (d. 1209), who evidently knew of "a highly developed hierarchy of God's friends." The differences in terminology between the various celestial hierarchies presented by these authors were reconciled by later scholars through their belief that the earlier mystics had highlighted particular parts and different aspects of a single, cohesive hierarchy of saints.

Sufism
The goal of the Sufi path is to achieve unification of the self with God (fanāʾ). The concept is often described in Sufi allegories as the self mirroring the light of God. Accordingly, the soul is tainted and in need of purification. In the purified state of the Sufi saint, the Sufi's spotless mind realizes that it has no real existence in itself; his existence is only God's light and he is only the mirror.

In certain esoteric teachings of Islam, there is said to be a cosmic spiritual hierarchy whose ranks include walis (saints, friends of God), abdals (changed ones), headed by a ghawth (helper) or qutb (pole, axis). The details vary according to the source.

One source is the 12th Century Persian Ali Hujwiri. In his divine court, there are three hundred akhyār ("excellent ones"), forty abdāl ("substitutes"), seven abrār ("piously devoted ones"), four awtād ("pillars"), three nuqabā ("leaders") and one qutb.

"All these saints know one another and cannot act without mutual consent. It is the task of the Awtad to go round the whole world every night, and if there should be any place on which their eyes have not fallen, next day some flaw will appear in that place, and they must then inform the Qutb in order that he may direct his attention to the weak spot and that by his blessings the imperfection may be remedied."

Another is from Ibn Arabi, who lived in Moorish Spain. It has a more exclusive structure. There are eight nujabā ("nobles"), twelve nuqabā, seven abdāl, four awtād, two a'immah ("guides"), and the qutb.

According to the 20th-century Sufi Inayat Khan, there are seven degrees in the hierarchy. In ascending order, they are pir, buzurg, wali, ghaus, qutb, nabi and rasul He does not say how the levels are populated. Pirs and buzurgs assist the spiritual progress of those who approach them. Walis may take responsibility for protecting a community and generally work in secret. Qutbs are similarly responsible for large regions. Nabis are charged with bringing a reforming message to nations or faiths, and hence have a public role. Rasuls likewise have a mission of transformation of the world at large.

Regional veneration
The amount of veneration a specific saint received varied from region to region in Islamic civilization, often on the basis of the saint's own history in that region. While the veneration of saints played a crucial role in the daily piety of Sunni Muslims all over the Islamic world for more than a thousand years (ca. 800–1800), exactly which saints were most widely venerated in any given cultural climate depended on the hagiographic traditions of that particular area. Thus, while Moinuddin Chishti (d. 1236), for example, was honored throughout the Sunni world in the medieval period, his cultus was especially prominent in the Indian subcontinent, as that is where he was believed to have preached, performed the majority of his miracles, and ultimately settled at the end of his life.

North Africa
The veneration of saints has played "an essential role in the religious, and social life of the Maghreb for more or less a millennium"; in other words, since Islam first reached the lands of North Africa in the eighth century. The first written references to ascetic Muslim saints in Africa, "popularly admired and with followings," appear in tenth-century hagiographies. As has been noted by scholars, however, "the phenomenon may well be older," for many of the stories of the Islamic saints were passed down orally before finally being put to writing. One of the most widely venerated saints in early North African Islamic history was Abū Yaʿzā (or Yaʿazzā, d. 1177), an illiterate Sunni Maliki miracle worker whose reputation for sanctity was admired even in his own life. Another immensely popular saint of the time-period was Ibn Ḥirzihim (d. 1163), who also gained renown for his personal devoutness and his ability to work miracles. It was Abu Madyan (d. 1197), however, who eventually became one of the Awliya Allah of the entire Maghreb. A "spiritual disciple of these two preceding saints," Abū Madyan, a prominent Sunni Maliki scholar, was the first figure in Maghrebi Sufism "to exercise an influence beyond his own region." Abū Madyan travelled to the East, where he is said to have met prominent mystics like the renowned Hanbali jurist Abdul-Qadir Gilani (d. 1166). Upon returning to the Maghreb, Abū Madyan stopped at Béjaïa and "formed a circle of disciples." Abū Madyan eventually died in Tlemcen, while making his way to the Almohad court of Marrakesh; he was later venerated as a prime Awliya Allah of Tlemcen by popular acclaim.

One of Abū Madyan's most notable disciples was ʿAbd al-Salām Ibn Mas̲h̲īs̲h̲ (d. 1127), a "saint ... [who] had a posthumous fame through his being recognised as a master and a 'pole' by" Abu 'l-Ḥasan al-S̲h̲ād̲h̲ilī (d. 1258). It was this last figure who became the preeminent saint in Maghrebi piety, due to his being the founder of one of the most famous Sunni Sufi orders of North Africa: the Shadhiliyya tariqa. Adhering to the Maliki maddhab in its jurisprudence, the Shadhili order produced numerous widely honored Sunni saints in the intervening years, including Fāsī Aḥmad al-Zarrūq (d. 1494), who was educated in Egypt but taught in Libya and Morocco, and Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad al-Jazūlī (d. 1465), "who returned to Morocco after a long trip to the East and then began a life as a hermit," and who achieved widespread renown for the miracles he is said to have wrought by the leave of God. Eventually, the latter was buried in Marrakesh, where he ended up becoming of the city's seven most famous Awliya Allah for the Sunnis of the area. Some of the most popular and influential Maghrebi saints and mystics of the following centuries were Muḥammad b. Nāṣir (d. 1674), Aḥmad al-Tij̲ānī (d. 1815), Abū Ḥāmid al-ʿArabī al-Darqāwī (d. 1823), and Aḥmad b. ʿAlāwī (d. 1934), with the latter three originating Sufi orders of their own. Famous adherents of the Shadhili order amongst modern Islamic scholars include Abdallah Bin Bayyah (b. 1935), Muhammad Alawi al-Maliki (d. 2004), Hamza Yusuf (b. 1958), and Muhammad al-Yaqoubi (b. 1963).

The veneration of saints in Maghrebi Sunni Islam has been studied by scholars with regard to the various "types" of saints venerated by Sunnis in those areas. These include:

 * (1) the "pure, ascetic hermit," who is honored for having refused all ostentation, and is commemorated not on account of his written works but by virtue of the reputation he is believed to have had for personal sanctity, miracles, and "inward wisdom or gnosis";
 * (2) "the ecstatic and eccentric saint" (mad̲j̲d̲h̲ūb), who is believed to have maintained orthodoxy in his fulfillment of the pillars of the faith, but who is famous for having taught in an unusually direct style or for having divulged the highest truths before the majority in a manner akin to Hallaj (d. 922). Famous and widely venerated saints of this "type" include Ibn al-Marʾa (d. 1214), ʿAlī al-Ṣanhāj̲ī (ca. 16th-century), ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Mad̲j̲d̲h̲ūb (literally "ʿAbd al-Raḥmān the Ecstatic", d. 1569);
 * (3) the "warrior saint" (pl. murābiṭūn) or martyr;
 * (4) female saints, who may belong to one of the aforementioned three categories or some other. It has been remarked that "Maghrebi sainthood is by no means confined to men, and ... some of the tombs of female saints are very frequently visited."
 * (5) "Jewish saints", that is to say, venerable Jewish personages whose tombs are frequented by Sunni Muslims in the area for the seeking of blessings

Regarding the veneration of saints amongst Sunni Muslims in the Maghreb in the present day, scholars have noted the presence of many "thousands of minor, local saints whose tombs remain visible in villages or the quarters of towns." Although many of these saints lack precise historiographies or hagiographies, "their presence and their social efficacity ... [are] immense" in shaping the spiritual life of Muslims in the region. For the vast majority of Muslims in the Maghreb even today, the saints remain "very much alive at their tomb, to the point that the person's name most often serves to denote the place." While this classical type of Sunni veneration represents the most widespread stance in the area, the modern influence of Salafism and Wahhabism have challenged the traditional practice in some quarters.

Turkey, the Balkans, the Caucasus and Azerbaijan
Scholars have noted the tremendously "important role" the veneration of saints has historically played in Islamic life all these areas, especially amongst Sunnis who frequent the many thousands of tombs scattered throughout the region for blessings in performing the act of ziyāra. According to scholars, "between the Turks of the Balkans and Anatolia, and those in Central Asia, despite the distance separating them, the concept of the saint and the organisation of pilgrimages displays no fundamental differences." The veneration of saints really spread in the Turkish lands from the tenth to the fourteenth centuries, and played a crucial role in medieval Turkic Sunni piety not only in cosmopolitan cities but also "in rural areas and amongst nomads of the whole Turkish world." One of the reasons proposed by scholars for the popularity of saints in pre-modern Turkey is that Islam was majorly spread by the early Sunni Sufis in the Turkish lands, rather than by purely exoteric teachers. Most of the saints venerated in Turkey belonged to the Hanafi school of Sunni jurisprudence.

As scholars have noted, saints venerated in traditional Turkish Sunni Islam may be classified into three principal categories:
 * (1) The g̲h̲āzīs or early Muslims saints who preached the faith in the region and were often martyred for their religion. Some of the most famous and widely venerated saints of this category include the prophet Muhammad's companion Abū Ayyūb al-Anṣārī (d. 674), who was killed beneath the walls of Constantinople and was honored as a martyr shortly thereafter, and Sayyid Baṭṭāl G̲h̲āzī (d. ninth-century), who fought the Christians in Anatolia during the Umayyad period.
 * (2) Sufi saints, who were most often Sunni mystics who belonged to the Hanafi school of Sunni jurisprudence and were attached to one of the orthodox Sufi orders like the Naqshbandi or the Mevlevi.
 * (3) The "greats figures of Islam", both pre-Islamic and those who came after Muhammad, as well as certain sainted rulers.

Reverence of Awliya Allah
Reverence for Awliya Allah have been an important part of both Sunni and Shia Islamic tradition that particularly important classical saints have served as the heavenly advocates for specific Muslim empires, nations, cities, towns, and villages. With regard to the sheer omnipresence of this belief, the late Martin Lings wrote: "There is scarcely a region in the empire of Islam which has not a Sufi for its Patron Saint." As the veneration accorded saints often develops purely organically in Islamic climates, the Awliya Allah are often recognized through popular acclaim rather than through official declaration. Traditionally, it has been understood that the Wali'Allah of a particular place prays for that place's well-being and for the health and happiness of all who live therein. Here is a partial list of Muslim Awliya Allah:

Primary

 * Ibn Abi 'l-Dunyā, K. al-Awliyāʾ, in Mad̲j̲mūʿat rasāʾil, Cairo 1354/1935
 * Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣbahānī, Ḥilyat al-awliyāʾ, Cairo 1351 ff./1932 ff.
 * Abū Saʿīd al-K̲h̲arrāz, K. al-Kas̲h̲f wa 'l-bayān, ed. Ḳ. al-Sāmarrāʾī, Bag̲h̲dād 1967
 * al-Ḥakīm al-Tirmid̲h̲ī, K. K̲h̲atm al-awliyāʾ, ed. O. Yaḥyā, Beirut 1965
 * idem, K. Sīrat al-awliyāʾ, ed. B. Radtke, in Drei Schrijten, i, 1-134, Beirut 1992
 * idem, al-Farḳ bayn al-āyāt wa 'l-karāmāt, ms. Ankara, Ismail Saib i, 1571, fols. 152b-177b
 * idem, Badʾ s̲h̲aʾn Abī ʿAbd Allāh, ed. Yaḥyā, in Tirmid̲h̲ī, K̲h̲atm, 14-32, facs. and German tr. in Radtke, Tirmid̲iana minora, 244-77, Eng. tr. in Radtke and O'Kane, Concept of sainthood, 15-36. Handbooks.
 * Bādisī, "al-Maḳṣad", tr. G. Colin, in Archives marocaines, xxvi-xxvii (1926)
 * G̲h̲ubrīnī, ʿUnwān al-dirāya, Algiers 1970
 * Hud̲j̲wīrī, Kas̲h̲f al-maḥd̲j̲ūb, ed. V. Zhukovsky, repr. Tehran 1336/1958, 265 ff., tr. Nicholson, The Kashf al-mahjūb. The oldest Persian treatise on Sufism, Leiden-London 1911, 210-41
 * Kalābād̲h̲ī, al-Taʿarruf li-mad̲h̲hab ahl al-taṣawwuf ed. Arberry, Cairo 1934, tr. idem, The doctrine of the Sufis, 2, Cambridge 1977, ch. 26
 * Sarrād̲j̲, K. al-Lumaʿ fi 'l-taṣawwuf, ed. Nicholson, Leiden-London 1914, 315-32, Ger. tr. R. Gramlich, Schlaglichter über das Sufitum, Stuttgart 1990, 449-68
 * Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī, Ḳūt al-ḳulūb, Cairo 1932, Ger. tr. Gramlich, Die Nährung der Herzen, Wiesbaden 1992–95, index, s.v. Gottesfreund
 * Ḳus̲h̲ayrī, Risāla, many eds., Ger. tr. Gramlich, Das Sendschreiben al-Qušayrīs, Wiesbaden 1989, index, s.v. Gottesfreund
 * ʿAmmār al-Bidlīsī, Zwei mystische Schriften, ed. E. Badeen, forthcoming Beirut
 * Ibn al-ʿArabī, al-Futūḥāt al-makkiyya, Cairo 1329–1911.
 * idem, Rūḥ al-ḳuds, Damascus 1964, Eng. tr. R.W. Austin, The Sufis of Andalusia, London 1971, Fr. tr. G. Leconte, Les Soufies d'Andalousie, Paris 1995
 * F. Meier, Die Vita des Scheich Abū Isḥāq al-Kāzarūnī, Leipzig 1948
 * Muḥammad b. Munawwar, Asrār al-tawḥīd fī maḳāmāt al-S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ Abī Saʿīd, ed. Muḥammad S̲h̲afīʿī-i Kadkanī, Tehran 1366-7, Eng. tr. J. O'Kane, The secrets of God's mystical oneness, New York 1992
 * ʿAzīz al-Dīn Nasafī, K. al-Insān al-kāmil, ed. M. Mole, Tehran-Paris 1962, 313-25
 * Ibn Taymiyya, al-Furḳān bayna awliyāʾ al-Raḥmān wa-awliyāʾ al-S̲h̲ayṭān, Cairo 1366/1947
 * idem, Ḥaḳīḳat mad̲h̲hab al-ittiḥādiyyīn, in Mad̲j̲mūʿat al-Rasāʾil wa 'l-masāʾil, iv, Cairo n.d., 1 ff.
 * Ibn ʿAṭāʾ Allāh, Laṭāʾif al-minan, Fr. tr. E. Geoffroy, La sagesse des maîtres soufis, Paris 1998

Secondary

 * Henri Corbin, En Islam iranien, esp. iii, Paris 1972
 * Michel Chodkiewicz, Le sceau des saints, Paris 1986
 * Jahrhundert Hidschra. Eine Geschichte des religiösen Denkens im frühen Islam, i-vi, Berlin-New York 1991-7
 * B. Radtke and J. O'Kane, The concept of sainthood in early Islamic mysticism, London 1996
 * Radtke, Drei Schriften des Theosophen von Tirmid̲, i, Beirut-Stuttgart 1992, ii, Beirut-Stuttgart 1996
 * R. Mach, Der Zaddik in Talmud und Midrasch, Leiden 1957
 * Radtke, "Tirmid̲iana minora", in Oriens, xxxiv (1994), 242-98
 * Gramlich, Die Wunder der Freunde Gottes, Wiesbaden 1987
 * idem, Die schiitischen Derwischorden Persiens, Wiesbaden 1965–81, ii, 160-5 (on the hierarchy of saints)
 * C. Ernst, Ruzbihan Baqli, London 1996
 * Radtke, "Zwischen Traditionalisms und Intellektualismus. Geistesgeschichtliche und historiografische Bemerkungen zum Ibrīz des Aḥmad b. al-Mubārak al-Lamaṭī", in Built on solid rock. Festschrift für Ebbe Knudsen, Oslo 1997, 240-67
 * H.S. Nyberg, Kleinere Schriften des Ibn al-ʿArabī, Leiden 1919, 103-20
 * A. Afifi, The mystical philosophy of Muhyid-din Ibnul-ʿArabi, Cambridge 1939
 * W. Chittick, The Sufi path of knowledge, Albany 1989
 * Jamil M. Abun-Nasr, The Tijaniyya. A Sufi order in the modern world, London 1965
 * Radtke, "Lehrer-Schüler-Enkel. Aḥmad b. Idrīs, Muḥammad ʿUt̲mān al-Mīrġanī, Ismāʿīl al-Walī", in Oriens, xxxiii (1992), 94-132
 * I. Goldziher, "Die Heiligenverehrung im Islam", in Muh. Stud., ii, 275-378
 * Grace Martin Smith and C.W. Ernst (eds.), Manifestations of sainthood in Islam, Istanbul 1993
 * H.-Ch. Loir et Cl. Gilliot (eds.), Le culte des saints dans le monde musulman, Paris 1995.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Wali


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Statler and Waldorf

Statler and Waldorf are a pair of Muppet characters from the sketch comedy television series The Muppet Show, best known for their cantankerous opinions and shared penchant for heckling. The two elderly men first appeared in The Muppet Show in 1975, where they consistently jeered the entirety of the cast and their performances from their box seats.

Created by Jim Henson, the characters have been performed by numerous puppeteers, including Henson, in a variety of films and television productions within the Muppet franchise. Statler and Waldorf are named after two landmark New York City hotels, the Statler Hilton and the Waldorf-Astoria.

Characters
The characters are known for their heckling. In The Muppet Show, the two are always criticizing Fozzie Bear's humor, except for one occasion when Fozzie heckles them back. In contrast, they find themselves vastly entertaining and inevitably burst into mutual laughter at their own witticisms. It is later revealed in the A Muppet Family Christmas special that the two hecklers are friends with Fozzie's mother, Emily Bear. Despite constantly complaining about the show and how terrible some acts are, they always return for the following week and occupy their usual box seats. Their reasons for doing so are a mystery even to them, according to one version of the Muppet Show theme (Waldorf: "Why do we always come here?" / Statler: "I guess we'll never know").

They also have a predisposition for breaking the fourth wall. Author Ben Underwood remarked on how the characters generally "blur the boundary between performer and audience", as they are "concurrently audience members and performers". Underwood points to a second season incident in which the characters see themselves watching the Muppets, with Statler skeptical, saying "No one would watch junk like that".

History
The puppets were designed by Bonnie Erickson. They were named after two historic New York City hotels, the Statler Hilton and the Waldorf-Astoria.

In "Sex and Violence", the pilot episode of The Muppet Show, Statler and Waldorf were performed by Jerry Nelson and Jim Henson, respectively. Nelson was unavailable for the first few weeks of production on The Muppet Show. As a result, Richard Hunt took on the role of Statler. Hunt and Henson would continue to perform the two characters until Henson's death in 1990. To portray the characters, Hunt and Henson shared very close space, often for hours at a time.

Beginning with The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992), Statler and Waldorf were performed by Jerry Nelson and Dave Goelz, respectively. When Jerry Nelson left the Muppets, citing health reasons, Muppeteer Steve Whitmire took over as Statler. The two were occasionally performed by Drew Massey (Statler) and Victor Yerrid (Waldorf) in 2005 and 2006, most notably in the web series Statler and Waldorf: From the Balcony. Kevin Clash filled in for Goelz as Waldorf in a few episodes of Muppets Tonight.

In 2017, Whitmire departed from the Muppets franchise, including the part of Statler, after being unwillingly dismissed from the part of Kermit the Frog in October 2016. While Matt Vogel was announced for the replacement for Kermit, Peter Linz had already replaced Whitmire as the voice of Statler in advertisements.

Appearances
Statler and Waldorf also appeared (as adults) in the Saturday morning animated television series Muppet Babies. Both characters were voiced by Dave Coulier.

In The Muppet Christmas Carol, they played the ghosts of Jacob and Robert Marley. Whereas the novel A Christmas Carol features only a Jacob Marley, creating a Robert allowed for including the two Muppets, and possibly also references Bob Marley. When Ebenezer Scrooge, played by Michael Caine, accuses them of always criticizing him, they reply "We were always heckling you." In Muppet Treasure Island, they were the figureheads of the Hispaniola. Statler complains about being stuck on the front of the ship, to which Waldorf replies it is better than being in the audience.

In the 1996 series Muppets Tonight, based on a television rather than theatre show, Statler and Waldorf were shown watching the show at an assisted living facility, still making disparaging remarks. The duo are featured characters at Disney's Muppet*Vision 3D at Disney's Hollywood Studios as audio-animatronic Muppets helping Bean Bunny escape the theater and, of course, heckling the show. They also make a cameo appearance in Pixar's 2008 short film Presto, where they can be seen in their theater box.

The Muppet Newsflash: A Jim Henson News Blog announced on September 17, 2009, that Statler and Waldorf would release a book titled From the Balcony in 2010. However, the book was never released.

Statler and Waldorf appear in featured roles in The Muppets film. They are shown in Kermit's old office where they inform evil oil baron Tex Richman that the only thing that could stop his purchase of The Muppet Theater would be Kermit raising $10 million. They appear during one scene of the 2014 sequel Muppets Most Wanted. When the Muppets arrive in Berlin to perform at a run-down cabaret theater, marked by a sign reading "Die Muppets" ("The Muppets" in German), the two joke as to whether this is an early review or a suggestion. This scene is presented in the "Statler and Waldorf Cut" of the film in its home video release.

They appear as audience members in The Muppets TV series. The episode "Pig Out" features a B-plot focusing on Statler without Waldorf. They also appear on Muppets Now.

From the Balcony
Statler and Waldorf: From the Balcony is a multi-award-winning web show which ran biweekly on Movies.com from June 2005 until September 2006. The series spawned more than 35 episodes and featured many Muppet characters, both well-known classics and newly created characters. The two elderly curmudgeons would discuss upcoming films, watch the latest movie trailers and share the week's "balconism" from their theater box.

Guest appearances

 * Both made an appearance in Marvel Team-Up #74. In this issue, Spider-Man teams up with the cast of Saturday Night Live to battle the Silver Samurai. Statler and Waldorf appear in typical style as hecklers on a balcony.
 * Both made an appearance in the 2012 final chapter of Major League Chew, set in the Image Universe.
 * They appear at the end of Weezer's video for the song "'Keep Fishin'". They comment that the performance was not half bad, before adding that it was all bad.
 * On the song "The Black Hole" by HORSE the band, the track ends with Statler and Waldorf celebrating the song and then talking themselves into decrying it as "terrible".
 * On September 18, 2009, Statler and Waldorf were shown in a routine on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien called "Statler and Waldorf Heckle Obama", consisting of a video recording of President Barack Obama at a health care rally, with old Muppet Show clips of Statler and Waldorf interspersed within it.
 * Statler and Waldorf are feature characters in the 2011 movie The Muppets. To promote the film, they also appeared with several other Muppets on the 2011 Halloween episode of WWE Raw, with the duo offering their usual commentary from a skybox.
 * The pair make occasional cameos in Family Guy, such as heckling Lost after Peter builds a balcony in his living room ("Petergeist") or a cutaway where Statler is shown without Waldorf and realises he enjoys the show without "the other guy" there to egg him on ("Jerome is the New Black").
 * The pair also appeared "via satellite" as BFCA critics at the 2012 Critics' Choice Movie Awards on January 12, 2012.
 * Statler and Waldorf appeared several times from the balcony to critique the performers at The Secret Policeman's Ball 2012 at Radio City Music Hall in New York City on March 4, 2012.

Reception
In The Guardian, Hadley Freeman wrote "Not even celebrity guest Milton Berle could compete with their sharp banter. My heroes". In 2014, Esquire's Nick Schager named them one of The 10 Most Entertaining Fictional Critics, writing "the funniest Muppets characters have always been Statler and Waldorf". In 2015, The Huffington Post identified Statler and Waldorf as popular Muppets, and said to the fans who love them above others, "You know the best way to cope with life's difficulties is by laughing at someone else's expense".

Commentators sometimes make comparisons between people and Statler and Waldorf in attention to, or preoccupation with, details, "loud" opinion, or "cantankerous" personality. In 2012, Der Spiegel described the United Kingdom as "at best spectators in the gallery, like Statler and Waldorf", within Europe, drawing the ire of British media.

title: Statler and Waldorf


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Talk:A Medal for Benny

Untitled
This is more a biography of Jack Wagner than it is a discussion of the article title. RickK 01:32 22 Jul 2003 (UTC)

title: Talk:A Medal for Benny


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Royal Gorge

The Royal Gorge is a canyon of the Arkansas River located west of Cañon City, Colorado. The canyon begins at the mouth of Grape Creek, about 2 mi west of central Cañon City, and continues in a west-northwesterly direction for approximately 6 mi until ending near U.S. Route 50. Being one of the deepest canyons in Colorado, it is also known as the Grand Canyon of the Arkansas (River), with a maximum depth of 1250 ft. The canyon is also very narrow, measuring from 50 ft wide at its base to 300 ft wide at its top, as it carves a path through the granite formations below Fremont Peak and YMCA Mountain, which rise above the north and south rims, respectively.

Natural history
The path of the Arkansas River was already set when the granite uplift that would eventually form the Rocky Mountains began. About 3 million years ago, as the mountains began to rise from the surrounding plains, the Arkansas Riverthen only a small streambegan to wear away at the stone it flowed across. Scientists estimate that the mountains surrounding the canyon rose at a rate of approximately one foot every 2500 years. Over the millennia, this small stream grew, cutting a deep channel for itself through the surrounding granite. The gorge's peculiar shape, contrasted to broad canyons such as the Grand Canyon, can be attributed to this long, direct erosion through hard rock.

Early history and European settlement
Before European settlement, Native Americans of the Ute people wintered in Royal Gorge for its protection from wind and its relatively mild climate. The Comanche, Kiowa, Sioux and Cheyenne used Royal Gorge on buffalo hunting expeditions as an access point to mountain meadow regions such as South Park Basin. Colorado's Rocky Mountain region fell under Spanish claims, and conquistador expeditions of the 17th century or fur traders may have seen Royal Gorge in their traversal of the area. The first recorded instance of a European arrival, however, is the Pike Expedition of 1806. Zebulon Pike's group built a crude shelter in the gorge and explored the area, descending on horseback over the frozen Arkansas River.

Nearby Cañon City was founded in 1860 to exploit possible mineral deposits in the area. Discovery of silver and lead near Leadville in 1877 prompted a race to build rail access to the area. Royal Gorge was a bottleneck along the Arkansas too narrow for both the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway and the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad to pass through, and there was no other reasonable access to the South Park area. Both railroads thus took to fighting the "Royal Gorge Railroad War", two years of essentially low-level guerrilla warfare between the two companies. Federal intervention prompted the so-called "Treaty of Boston" to end the struggle. The D&RGW completed its line and leased it for use by the Santa Fe.

In the 1890s Royal Gorge was used as a passenger route for transcontinental rail travel. As many as four trains per day went through the gorge, though in time the establishment of alternate routes through the mountains made the Royal Gorge fall from favor for transcontinental use, and passenger train service on the main line was discontinued in 1967. A sightseeing train now follows the route through the gorge.

Modern history
On May 7, 1879, the first excursion train traveled through the Royal Gorge after years of court battles between the Denver & Rio Grande and the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe (AT&SF or Santa Fe) railroads.

The Royal Gorge Route Railroad now operates excursion trains through the Royal Gorge throughout the year. The train travels 11 miles through the canyon from Cañon City, Colorado to the caretakers house.

In 1906 Guy U. Hardy, a local newspaper editor and future Congressman, lobbied to establish an 8 mile park at Royal Gorge by having the land ceded to the City of Cañon City. Royal Gorge Park was then created.

In 1929 Cañon City authorized the building of the Royal Gorge Bridge, which at 955 ft above the river held the record of highest bridge in the world from 1929 to 2001. The bridge is the centerpiece of Royal Gorge Bridge and Park, an amusement park with rides and attractions on both sides of the gorge. The land and bridge are owned by the city and leased to a Dallas-based company called the Royal Gorge Bridge Company which has held the leasing rights since 1947. Another Dallas-based company called Leisure and Recreational Concepts was hired by the Royal Gorge Bridge Company in 1984 to handle daily operations of the park.

In the movie Sensations of 1945, Hubert Castle plays the role of Olaf, “The Great Gustafson,” who performs a high-wire publicity stunt above the canyon. It is notable that Cañon City’s own Bird Millman never did attempt such a feat herself.

In 1948, images from the park appeared in Canon City (film), which is based on the true story of a prison break.

In 1955, portions of the film Big House, U.S.A., starring Broderick Crawford, Ralph Meeker, Lon Chaney Jr., William Talman, Charles Bronson and Felicia Farr (credited as Randy Farr), were filmed in Royal Gorge Park and Cañon City.

On June 11, 2013, a wildfire broke out near the Royal Gorge Bridge and Park which ultimately destroyed 48 of 52 buildings in the park on both sides of the gorge. The bridge was only lightly damaged, with some scorched planks requiring replacement. The park was rebuilt and opened once again on August 30, 2014.

In the summer months, rafting is a very popular activity in the Royal Gorge. Tourists travel from around the world to tackle the Class IV rapids of the Arkansas River and enjoy the scenery of the gorge. Named rapids in the gorge include Sunshine Falls, Sledgehammer, Wallslammer, Corkscrew, the Narrows, Boateater and Soda Pop Rock. River recreation in the gorge is regulated by the Arkansas Headwaters Recreation Area (AHRA) and daily user fees are required to launch at all of the recreation sites upstream of the gorge. There are many commercial rafting companies which are licensed by the AHRA to run the gorge and summer weekends can see hundreds of rafts packing the river.

BASE jumping, bungee jumping and rock climbing are generally not permitted at the Royal Gorge. Occasionally, during special events such as the GoFast Games, bridge jumps have been allowed by the city and the lessee of the bridge and park.

The cost of admission has increased over the years. In 2023, the price was USD$32 for adults, USD$27 for age 3 to 11.

title: Royal Gorge


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Decimetre

The decimetre (or decimeter in American English; symbol: dm), is a unit of length in the International System of Units, equal to one tenth of a metre, ten centimetres, one hundred millimetres, and 3.937 inches.

The common non-SI metric unit of volume, the litre, is defined as one cubic decimetre, although, from 1901 to 1964, there was a slight difference between the two due to the litre being defined using the kilogram rather than the metre.

Markings of a ship's draft are shown in decimeters in most of the world.

title: Decimetre


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Al-Azhar University

The Al-Azhar University (جامعة الأزهر (الشريف),, lit. 'University of (the honorable) Al-Azhar') is a public university in Cairo, Egypt. Associated with Al-Azhar Al-Sharif in Islamic Cairo, it is Egypt's oldest degree-granting university and is known as one of the most prestigious universities for Islamic learning. In addition to higher education, Al-Azhar oversees a national network of schools with approximately two million students. over 4,000 teaching institutes in Egypt were affiliated with the university.

Founded in 970 or 972 by the Fatimid Caliphate as a centre of Islamic learning, its students studied the Qur'an and Islamic law in detail, along with logic, grammar, rhetoric, and how to calculate the phases of the moon. Today it is the chief centre of Arabic literature and Islamic learning in the world. In 1961 additional non-religious subjects were added to its curriculum.

Its library is considered second in importance in Egypt only to the Egyptian National Library and Archives. In May 2005, Al-Azhar in partnership with a Dubai information technology enterprise, IT Education Project (ITEP) launched the H.H. Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum project to preserve Al-Azhar scripts and publish them online (the "Al-Azhar Online Project") to eventually publish online access to the library's entire rare manuscripts collection, comprising about seven million pages of material.

Beginnings under the Fatimids
Al-Azhar is one of the relics of the Isma'ili Shi'a Fatimid dynasty, which claimed descent from Fatimah, daughter of Muhammad and wife of Ali, son-in-law, and cousin of Muhammad. Fatimah was called al-Zahra (the luminous), and the institution was named in her honor. It was founded as a mosque by the Fatimid commander Jawhar al-Siqilli at the orders of the Caliph and Imam Al-Mu'izz li-Din Allah as he founded the city for Cairo. It was begun (probably on Saturday) in Jumada al-Awwal in the year AH 359 (March/April 970 CE). Its building was completed on the 9th of Ramadan in AH 361 (24 June 972 CE). Both Caliph al-Aziz Billah and Caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah added to its premises. It was further repaired, renovated, and extended by al-Mustansir Billah and al-Hafiz li-Din Allah. The Fatimid caliphs always encouraged scholars and jurists to have their study-circles and gatherings in this mosque and thus it was turned into a madrasa which has the claim to be considered as the oldest such institution still functioning. The mosque provided teaching on a variety of subjects from a variety of scholars. According to Syed Farid Alatas, these subjects included Islamic law and jurisprudence, Arabic grammar, Islamic astronomy, Islamic philosophy, and logic. Under the Fatimids, Al-Azhar also notably promoted Shia Islam.

Saladin
In the 12th century, following the overthrow of the Isma'ili Fatimid dynasty, Saladin (the founder of the Sunni Ayyubid dynasty) converted Al-Azhar to a Shafi'ite Sunni center of learning. Therefore, "he had all the treasures of the palace, including the books, sold over a period of ten years. Many were burned, thrown into the Nile, or thrown into a great heap, which was covered with sand, so that a regular "hill of books" was formed and the soldiers used to sole their shoes with the fine bindings. The number of books said to have disposed of varies from 120,000 to 2,000,000." Abd-el-latif delivered lectures on Islamic medicine at Al-Azhar, while according to legend the Jewish philosopher Maimonides delivered lectures on medicine and astronomy there during the time of Saladin though no historical proof has corroborated this.

Saladin introduced the college system in Egypt, which was also adopted in Al-Azhar. Under this system, the college was a separate institution within the mosque compound, with its own classrooms, dormitories and a library.

Mamluks
Under the Mamluks, Al-Azhar gained influence and rose in prestige. The Mamluks established salaries for instructors and stipends for the students and gave the institution an endowment. A college was built for the institution in 1340, outside of the mosque. In the late 1400s, the buildings were renovated and new dormitories were built for the students.

During this time Cairo had 70 other institutions of Islamic learning, however, Al-Azhar attracted many scholars due to its prestige. The famed Ibn Khaldun taught at Al-Azhar starting in 1383.

During this time texts were few and much of the learning happened by students memorizing their teachers' lectures and notes. In fact, blind young boys were enrolled at Al-Azhar in the hopes that they could eventually earn a living as teachers.

Ottomans
During the Ottoman period, Al-Azhar's prestige and influence grew to the point of becoming the preeminent institution for Islamic learning in the Sunni Muslim world. During this time, the Shaykh Al-Azhar was established, an office given to the leading scholar at the institution; prior to this the head of the institution was not necessarily a scholar. In 1748, the Ottoman pasha tried to get Al-Azhar to teach astronomy and mathematics, to little avail.

During the time there wasn't a system of academic degrees, instead the shaykh (professor) determined if the student was sufficiently trained to enter a professor (ijazah). The average length of study was 6 years. Despite the lack of bureaucracy, the training remained rigorous and prolonged. Students were loosely organized into riwaq (a sort of fraternity) organized according to their nationality and branch of Islamic law they studied. Each riwaq was supervised by a professor. A rector, usually a senior professor, oversaw the finances.

Post-Ottoman
By the mid 19th century, al-Azhar had surpassed Istanbul and was considered the capital of Sunni legal expertise; a main centre of power in the Islamic world; and a rival to Damascus, Mecca and Baghdad.

When the Kingdom of Egypt was established in 1923, the signing of the new nation's constitution was delayed because of King Fuad I's insistence that Al-Azhar and other religious institutions were to be subject to him and not the Egyptian parliament. The King Fuad I Edition of the Qur’an was first published on 10 July 1924 by a committee from Al-Azhar University Prominent committee members included Islamic scholar, Muhammad b. ‘Ali al-Husayni al-Haddad. Noteworthy Western scholars/academics working in Egypt at the time include Bergsträsser and Jeffery. Methodological differences aside, speculation alludes to a spirit of cooperation. Bergsträsser was certainly impressed with the work.

In March 1924, Abdülmecid II had been deposed as Caliph, supreme religious and political leader of all Muslims across the world. The Grand Sheikh of al-Azhar repudiated the abolition and was part of a call from Al-Azhar for an Islamic Conference. The unsuccessful "caliphate conference" was held under the presidency of the Grand Chancellor of Azhar in 1926 but no one was able to gain a consensus for the candidacy across the Islamic world. Candidates proposed for the caliphate included King Fuad.

Modernization
The pioneering Pakistani journalist Zaib-un-Nissa Hamidullah became the first woman to address the university in 1955. In 1961, Al-Azhar was re-established as a university under the government of Egypt's second President Gamal Abdel Nasser when a wide range of secular faculties were added for the first time, such as business, economics, science, pharmacy, medicine, engineering and agriculture. Before that date, the Encyclopaedia of Islam classifies the Al-Azhar variously as madrasa, center of higher learning and, since the 19th century, religious university, but not as a university in the full sense, referring to the modern transition process as "from madrasa to university". Other academic sources also refer to al-Azhar as a madrasa in pre-modern times before its transformation into a university. An Islamic women's faculty was also added in the same year.

Religious ideology
Historically, Al-Azhar had a membership that represented diverse opinions within Islam. The theological schools of al-Ash'ari and al-Maturidi were both represented. It has a long tradition of teaching all four schools of Sunni Islamic jurisprudence (Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi, and Hanbali). The chief mufti of each school of thought acted as the dean, responsible for the teachers and students in that group. During the time of the Ottomans, the Hanafi dean came to hold a position as primus inter pares. It also had membership from the seven main Sufi orders. Al-Azhar has had an antagonistic relationship with Wahhabism. According to a 2011 report issued by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Al Azhar is strongly Sufi in character: "Adherence to a Sufi order has long been standard for both professors and students in the al-Azhar mosque and university system. Although al-Azhar is not monolithic, its identity has been strongly associated with Sufism. The current Shaykh al-Azhar (rector of the school), Ahmed el-Tayeb, is a hereditary Sufi shaykh from Upper Egypt who has recently expressed his support for the formation of a world Sufi league; the former Grand Mufti of Egypt and senior al-Azhar scholar Ali Gomaa is also a highly respected Sufi master."

However, in the early 20th century, enlightened Modernist thinkers such as Muhammad Abduh led a reform of the curriculum, reintroducing a desire for legal reform through ijtihad. Subsequently, disputes were had between modernist intellectuals and traditionalists within al-Azhar. Al-Azhar now maintains a modernist position, advocating "Wasatiyya" (centrism), a reaction against the extreme textualism of many Wahhabi Salafi ideologues. Wasatiyya covers a range of thinkers, some of whom are liberal intellectuals with religious inclinations, preachers such as Yusuf al-Qaradawi and many members of the Muslim Brotherhood. Since the 2013 coup however, Al-Azhar has taken a position against the brotherhood.

The nineteenth and current Grand Mufti of Egypt and Al Azhar scholar, is Shawki Ibrahim Abdel-Karim Allam. The university is opposed to overt liberal reform of Islam and issued a fatwa against the liberal Ibn Rushd-Goethe mosque in Berlin because it banned face-covering veils such as burqa and niqab on its premises while allowing women and men to pray together. The fatwa encompassed all present and future liberal mosques.

Council of Senior Scholars
Al-Azhar University's Council of Senior Scholars was founded in 1911 but was replaced in 1961 by the Center for Islamic Research. In July 2012, after the law restricting Al-Azhar University's autonomy was modified by the incoming president Mohamed Morsi, the council was reformed. The Council consists of 40 members and as of February 2013 had 14 vacancies all appointed by the current imam of Al-Azhar, Ahmed El-Tayeb, who was appointed by the prior president, Hosni Mubarak. Once the remaining 14 vacancies are filled, new vacancies will be appointed by the existing Council itself. All four madhahib (schools) of Sunni Islamic jurisprudence are proportionally represented on the council (Hanafi, Shafi'i, Hanbali, Maliki) and voting is on a majority basis. In addition to El-Tayeb, other prominent members of the Council include the outgoing Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa. The council is tasked with nominating the Grand Mufti of Egypt (subject to presidential approval), electing the next Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Mosque, and is expected to be the final authority in determining if new legislation is compliant with Islamic law. Although the council's decisions are not binding (absent new legislation), it is expected that it would be difficult for the parliament to pass legislation deemed by the council as against Islamic law.

In January 2013, Al-Tayeb referred a relatively minor issue related to Islamic bonds to the council, for the first time asserting the council's jurisdiction. In 2013, the Council elected Shawki Ibrahim Abdel-Karim Allam to be the next Grand Mufti of Egypt. This marks the first time that the Grand Mufti would be elected by Islamic scholars since the position was created in 1895. Prior to this, the Egyptian head of state made the appointment.

Views
Al-Azhar's muftis have a history of being consulted on political issues. Muhammad Ali Pasha appointed Al-Azhar muftis to the Consultative Council in 1829 and this would be repeated by Abbas I and later Isma'il Pasha. At the same time, there were many cases where the Egyptian ruler would disregard the opinion of Al-Azhar scholars. Sheikh Muhammad Sayyid Tantawy noted that among the priorities of Muslims are "to master all knowledge of the world and the hereafter, not least the technology of modern weapons to strengthen and defend the community and faith". He added that "mastery over modern weaponry is important to prepare for any eventuality or prejudices of the others, although Islam is a religion of peace".

Sheikh Tantawy also reasserted that his is the best faith to follow and that Muslims have the duty of active da'wa. He has made declarations about Muslims interacting with non-Muslims who are not a threat to Muslims. There are non-Muslims living apart from Muslims and who are not enemies of Islam ("Muslims are allowed to undertake exchanges of interests with these non-Muslims so long as these ties do not tarnish the image of the faith"), and there are "the non-Muslims who live in the same country as the Muslims in cooperation and on friendly terms, and are not enemies of the faith" ("in this case, their rights and responsibilities are the same as the Muslims so long as they do not become enemies of Islam"). Shi'a fiqh (according to a fatwa by Al-Azhar) is accepted as a fifth school of Islamic thought.

In October 2007, Muhammad Sayyid Tantawy, then the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, drew allegations of stifling freedom of speech when he asked the Egyptian government to toughen its rules and punishments against journalists. During a Friday sermon in the presence of Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif and a number of ministers, Tantawy was alleged to have stated that journalism which contributes to the spread of false rumours rather than true news deserved to be boycotted, and that it was tantamount to sinning for readers to purchase such newspapers. Tantawy, a supporter of then Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, also called for a punishment of eighty lashes to "those who spread rumors" in an indictment of speculation by journalists over Mubarak's ill health and possible death. This was not the first time that he had criticized the Egyptian press regarding its news coverage nor the first time he in return had been accused by the press of opposing freedom of speech. During a religious celebration in the same month, Tantawy had released comments alluding to "the arrogant and the pretenders who accuse others with the ugliest vice and unsubstantiated charges". In response, Egypt's press union issued a statement suggesting that Tantawy appeared to be involved in inciting and escalating a campaign against journalists and freedom of the press. Tantawy died in 2010 and was succeeded by Mohamed Ahmed el-Tayeb.

In 2016 Ahmed el-Tayeb reissued the fatwa on Shia Muslims, calling Shia the fifth school of Islam and seeing no problem with conversions from Sunni to Shia Islam. However, the NGOs report that violence and propaganda against the country's Shia minority continues. Shia Muslims are frequently denied services in addition to being called derogatory names. Anti-Shia sentiment is spread through education at all levels. Clerics educated at Al-Azhar University publicly promote sectarian beliefs by calling Shia Muslims infidels and encourage isolation and marginalization of Shia Muslims in Egypt.

Scholars from Al-Azhar declared the writings to Farag Foda to be blasphemous. Muhammad al-Ghazali, a member of Al-Azhar, declared Foda to be guilty of apostasy. According to Geneive Abdo, Muhammad al-Ghazali also added that anyone killing an apostate would not be punished, while according to Nathan Brown, Muhammad al-Ghazali stopped just short of condoning Foroda's assassination. Foda was assassinated in June 1992, by an Egyptian terrorist group al-Jama'a al-Islamiyya, who claimed justification from Al-Azhar's fatwas. In response, a scholar at Al-Azhar published Man Qatala Faraj Fawda.

Notable people
10th–17th centuries
 * Sibt al-Maridini (1423 – 1506) Arab physicist, mathematician and astronomer
 * Abd al-'Aziz al-Wafa'i (15th century) Arab physicist, mathematician and astronomer
 * Abdul Qadir al-Baghdadi (1620–1682 AD) author, philologist, grammarian, magistrate, bibliophile and a leading literary figure of the Ottoman era

19th – early 20th centuries
 * Muhammad Abduh and Sayd Jamal edin Afghani, founder of Islamic Modernism
 * Izz ad-Din al-Qassam, founder and leader of Black Hand
 * Mohammad Amin al-Husayni, Mufti of Jerusalem
 * Ahmed Orabi, Egyptian nationalist and army general who led the Urabi Revolt against Khedive Tewfik

1910s–1950s
 * Hassan al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood (he graduated from Dar al-Ulum which is an affiliate of Cairo University)
 * Syed Mujtaba Ali, Bangladeshi author, journalist, travel enthusiast, academic, scholar and linguist; studied at the Al-Azhar University in Cairo during 1934–1935.
 * Dr. Ayub Ali, Bangladeshi Islamic scholar and educationist
 * Mehmed Handžić, a leader of Bosnian revivalists, one of authors of Resolution of Sarajevo Muslims and chairman of the Committee of National Salvation
 * Omar Abdel Rahman, leader of Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya, which has been designated a terrorist group by the governments of the United States and Egypt; currently serving a life term for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing
 * Taqiuddin al-Nabhani, the leader and founder of The Islamic Political Party, Hizb ut-Tahrir (The Party of Liberation)
 * Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, co-founder and leader of Hamas
 * Saad Zaghlul, leader of 1919 revolution in Egypt
 * Taha Hussein, Egyptian writer and intellectual
 * Muhammad Ma Jian, translator of the Qur'an into the Chinese language
 * Ahmad Meshari Al-Adwani, Kuwaiti poet and writer of Kuwait's national anthem Al-Nasheed Al-Watani
 * Ahmad al-Ghumari, Moroccan cleric, enrolled in 1921, dropped out due to a death in the family
 * Abdullah al-Ghumari, Moroccan cleric, graduated from Azhar in 1931
 * Abu Turab al-Zahiri, Indian-born Saudi Arabian writer

1950–present
 * Aliko Dangote, Nigerian business mogul, studied business at Al-Azhar
 * Akhtar Raza Khan, former Grand Mufti of India.
 * Sayyid Abdurahman Imbichikoya Thangal Al-Qasimi, Al-Baqavi, Al Azhari (1922-2015) - former president of Samastha Kerala Jamiat-ul-Ulema (1995-2004)
 * Zaib-un-Nissa Hamidullah, Pakistani journalist who in 1955 became the first woman to give a speech at the university
 * Mohammed Burhanuddin, Dai of Dawoodi Bohra researched and rediscovered Al-Azhar University's past history, awarded PhD from Al-Azhar University.
 * Abdullah Yusuf Azzam founder of the terrorist group Al-Qaeda, and a Palestinian Sunni Islamic scholar and theologian
 * Shire Jama Ahmed, Somali linguist who devised a Latin script for the Somali language
 * Mahmud Shaltut, Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar, issued in 1959 a Fatwa, declaring that Al-Azhar recognizes Shi'ism as a valid branch of Islam
 * Mahmoud Khalil Al-Hussary, Qari and Qur'anic scholar
 * Abdel-Halim Mahmoud, Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar, introduced the study of Sufism as a science through his writings and lectures on the matter
 * Ahmed Subhy Mansour, Islamic scholar, cleric, and founder of the Quranists, who was exiled from Egypt, lived in the United States as a political refugee
 * Taha Jabir Alalwani, president of Cordoba University (Ashburn, VA, USA), former chairman of the Fiqh Council of North America, and the president of the International Institute of Islamic Thought in Herndon, Virginia (USA)
 * Abdurrahman Wahid, former President of Indonesia
 * Muhammad Sayyid Tantawy, former Grand Imam of Al-Azhar (17 March 1996 to 10 March 2010)
 * Ahmed el-Tayeb, Grand Imam of Al-Azhar.
 * Muhammad Metwally Al Shaarawy
 * Egyptian Muslim jurist
 * Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, former President of The Republic of Maldives.
 * Sayyid Abdurahman Imbichikoya Thangal Al-Aydarusi Al-Azhari Al-Qasimi, Al-Baqavi, Islamic scholar from Indian state, Kerala; former President of Samastha Kerala Jamiat-ul-Ulema,(1995-2004), writer of [Al Arab Wal Arabiyya(Arabs And Arabic Language)(Arabic: العرب والعربية )]
 * Abdulla Saeed, Former Chief Justice, and Justice Supreme Court of The Republic of Maldives
 * Abdulla Mohamed, chief judge, Criminal Court of The Republic of Maldives.
 * Salamat P. Hashim, founder and leader of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in the Philippines.
 * Sheikh Khalifa Usman Nando, co-founder of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in the Philippines and Wa'lī of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.
 * Fathulla Jameel, former Foreign Minister of Maldives.
 * Burhanuddin Rabbani, former Soviet–Afghan War Mujahideen leader and president of Afghanistan
 * Muhammad Jameel Didi, Maldives author and writer
 * Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat Mursyidul Am (spiritual leader) of the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS) and former Menteri Besar (Chief Minister) of the Malaysian state of Kelantan
 * Abdul Hadi Awang president of the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS) and former Menteri Besar (Chief Minister) of the Malaysian state of Terengganu
 * Omar Maute, co-founder and leader of the Maute terrorist organization in Marawi, Philippines
 * Panakkad Shihab Thangal, Muslim religious leader, politician and Islamic scholar from the Indian state of Kerala; Qazi to hundreds of mahals in Kerala, President IUML Kerala 1975–2009
 * Saeed-ur-Rahman Azmi Nadvi, principal of Darul Uloom Nadwatul Ulama and chancellor of Integral University
 * Timothy Winter, founder of the Cambridge Muslim College, Aziz Foundation Professor of Islamic Studies at Cambridge Muslim College and Ebrahim College, director of studies (theology and religious studies) at Wolfson College, Cambridge, and Shaykh Zayed Lecturer in Islamic Studies in the Faculty of Divinity at the University of Cambridge
 * Mahmud Saedon, Bruneian muslim scholar
 * Mustafa Khattab, English translator of the Qur'an and author of 'The Clear Quran' Series
 * Tariq Najm, Iraqi politician

Online

 * al-Azhar University: university, Cairo, Egypt(Subscription), in Encyclopædia Britannica Online, by The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica, Laura Etheredge, Neha Parwani and Emily Rodriguez

title: Al-Azhar University


text:
Ken Dryden

Kenneth Wayne Dryden (born August 8, 1947) is a Canadian former professional ice hockey goaltender, politician, lawyer, businessman, and author. He is an Officer of the Order of Canada and a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame. He was a Liberal Member of Parliament from 2004 to 2011 and Minister of Social Development from 2004 to 2006. In 2017, the league counted him in history's 100 Greatest NHL Players. He received the Order of Hockey in Canada in 2020.

Early life and education
Dryden was born in Hamilton, Ontario, in 1947. His parents were Murray Dryden (1911–2004) and Margaret Adelia Campbell (1912–1985). He has a sister, Judy, and a brother, Dave, who was also an NHL goaltender. Dryden was raised in Islington, Ontario, then a suburb of Toronto. He played with the Etobicoke Indians of the Metro Junior B Hockey League as well as Humber Valley Packers of the Metro Toronto Hockey League.

Dryden was drafted fourteenth overall by the Boston Bruins in the 1964 NHL Amateur Draft. Days later, June 28, Boston traded Dryden, along with Alex Campbell, to the Montreal Canadiens for Paul Reid and Guy Allen. Dryden was told by his agent that he had been drafted by the Canadiens and did not find out until the mid-1970s that he had been drafted by the Bruins.

Rather than play for the Canadiens in 1964, Dryden pursued a B.A. degree in History at Cornell University, where he also played hockey until his graduation in 1969. He backstopped the Cornell Big Red to the 1967 National Collegiate Athletic Association championship and to three consecutive ECAC tournament championships, and won 76 of his 81 varsity starts. At Cornell, he was a member of the Quill and Dagger society. He also was a member of the Canadian amateur national team at the 1969 World Ice Hockey Championships tournament in Stockholm.

Dryden took a break from the NHL for the 1973–74 season to article for a Toronto law firm, and to earn an LL.B. degree he received from McGill University in 1973. During this time Dryden interned with Ralph Nader's Public Citizen organization. Inspired by Nader's call in Action for a Change for establishing Public Interest Research Group's, Dryden tried to establish the Ontario Public Interest Research Group in the Province of Ontario.

Dryden's jersey number 1 was retired by the Cornell Big Red on February 25, 2010; along with Joe Nieuwendyk, he is one of only two players to have their numbers retired by Cornell's hockey program.

Playing career
Dryden made his NHL debut on Sunday March 14, 1971 against the Pittsburgh Penguins in Pittsburgh. The Canadiens won the game 5-1, and the only goal scored against Ken was by a player named John Stewart. Later, on March 20, 1971, he played in a home game against his brother Dave Dryden, a fellow backup goaltender for Buffalo Sabres, when Canadiens starter Rogie Vachon suffered an injury; this still stands, as of 2021, as the only time a pair of brothers faced against each other as goaltenders. He was called up from the minors late in the season and played only six regular-season games, but rang up 1.65 goals-against average. This earned him the starting goaltending job for the playoffs ahead of veteran Rogie Vachon, and he helped the Canadiens to win the Stanley Cup. He also won the Conn Smythe Trophy as the most valuable player in the playoffs. He helped the Habs win five more Stanley Cups in 1973, 1976, 1977, 1978, and 1979.

The following year Dryden won the Calder Trophy as the rookie of the year; he was not eligible for it the previous year because he did not play enough regular-season games. He is the only player to win the Conn Smythe Trophy before winning the rookie of the year award, and the only goaltender to win both the Conn Smythe and the Stanley Cup before losing a regular-season game. In the autumn of 1972 Dryden played for Team Canada in the 1972 Summit Series against the Soviet national ice hockey team. Dryden played from 1971 to 1979, with a break during the entire 1973–74 season; he was unhappy with the contract that the Canadiens offered him, which he considered less than his market worth, given that he had won the Stanley Cup and Vezina Trophy. He announced on September 14, 1973, that he was joining the Toronto law firm of Osler, Hoskin and Harcourt as a legal clerk for the year, for $135 a week. He skipped training camp and held out that season. The Canadiens still had a good year, going 45-24-9, but lost in the first round of the playoffs to the New York Rangers in six games. The Canadiens allowed 56 more goals in the 1973–74 season than they had the year before with Dryden. Dryden used that year to fulfill the requirements for his law degree at McGill and article for a law firm. He retired for the last time on July 9, 1979.

Compared to those of most other great hockey players, Dryden's NHL career was very short: just over seven full seasons. Thus he did not amass record totals in most statistical categories. As he played all his years with a dynasty and retired before he passed his prime, his statistical percentages are unparalleled. His regular-season totals include a 74.3 winning percentage, a 2.24 goals-against average, a 92.2 save percentage, 46 shutouts, and 258 wins, only 57 losses and 74 ties in just 397 NHL games. He won the Vezina Trophy five times as the goaltender on the team who allowed the fewest goals and in the same years was selected as a First Team All-Star. In 1998, he was ranked number 25 on The Hockey News' list of the 100 Greatest Hockey Players, a remarkable achievement for a player with a comparatively brief career.

At 6 feet, 4 inches, Dryden was so tall that during stoppages in play he struck what became his trademark pose: leaning upon his stick. He was known as the "four-storey goalie," and was once referred to as "that thieving giraffe" by Boston Bruins superstar Phil Esposito, in reference to Dryden's skill and height. Unbeknownst to him, his pose was exactly the same as the one struck by fellow Canadiens goaltender, Georges Vézina, 60 years prior.

Dryden was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1983, as soon as he was eligible. His jersey number 29 was retired by the Canadiens on January 29, 2007. He was inducted into the Ontario Sports Hall of Fame in 2011.

Writing
Dryden wrote one book during his hockey career: Face-Off at the Summit. It was a diary about Team Canada in the Canada vs. Soviet Union series of 1972. The book has been out of print for many years.

After retiring from hockey Dryden wrote several more books. The Game was a commercial and critical success, and was nominated for a Governor General's Award in 1983. His next book, Home Game: Hockey and Life in Canada (1990), written with Roy MacGregor, was developed into an award-winning Canadian Broadcasting Corporation six-part documentary series for television. His fourth book was The Moved and the Shaken: The Story of One Man's Life (1993). His fifth book, In School: Our Kids, Our Teachers, Our Classrooms (1995), written with Roy MacGregor, was about Canada’s educational system. Becoming Canada (2010) argued for a new definition of Canada and its unique place in the world.

In 2019, he published Scotty: A Hockey Life Like No Other, his biography of his Canadiens coach Scotty Bowman. Dryden says at the beginning that he 'needed to write this book,' because 'Scotty had lived a truly unique life. He has experienced almost everything in hockey, up close, for the best part of a century - and his is a life that no on else will live again. It's a life that had to be captured. And it needs to be captured now, because time is moving on.'

Feeling that Bowman was 'too practical and focused' to be a natural storyteller, Dryden instead asked Bowman to think like a coach and select the 8 greatest teams of all time (but only one per dynasty) and explain what he thought about them, how we coach against them but also what was happening in his life at that time and through that process, Bowman's story would be told.

Commentator
Dryden worked as a television hockey commentator at the 1980, 1984 and 1988 Winter Olympics. He served as a colour commentator with play-by-play man Al Michaels for ABC's coverage of the "Miracle on Ice." Immediately before Mike Eruzione's game-winning goal for the US, Dryden expressed his concern that the team was "depending a little bit too much" on goaltender Jim Craig after Craig had just made "too many good saves."

Sports executive
In 1997, Dryden was hired as president of the Toronto Maple Leafs by minority owner Larry Tanenbaum. Pat Quinn became head coach in 1998, and there were reports that the two men had a frosty relationship. A few months after joining the Leafs, Quinn became general manager, a move thought by some to preempt Dryden from hiring former Canadiens teammate Bob Gainey.

Dryden spoke at the Open Ice Summit in 1999, to discuss improvements needed to ice hockey in Canada. He wanted delegates to accept that progress made at the lower levels and off the ice was important in achieving international results. He was cautious that change would come slowly and be costly, but felt the summit was an important step in making progress. He also urged for the end to persistent abuse of on-ice officials, or Canada would lose 10,000 referees each year. As a result of the summit, Hockey Canada started to educate on the importance of respect for game officials.

On August 29, 2003, with the hiring of John Ferguson, Jr. as general manager, there was a major management shakeup. Majority owner Steve Stavro was bought out by the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan and he stepped down as chairman in favour of Larry Tanenbaum. Quinn continued as head coach. Dryden's position was abolished, in favour of having both the Leafs' and Raptors' managers reporting directly to MLSE President and CEO Richard Peddie. Dryden was shuffled to the less important role of vice-chairman and given a spot on MLSE's board of directors. This was described by commentators as "sitting outside the loop", as Dryden did not report directly to Leafs ownership. He stayed on until 2004 when he resigned to enter politics.

Teaching
In January 2012, Dryden was appointed a "Special Visitor" at his alma mater McGill University's Institute for the Study of Canada. He taught a Canadian Studies course entitled "Thinking the Future to Make the Future," which focused on issues facing Canada in the future and possible solutions to them.

Political career
Dryden joined the Liberal Party of Canada and ran for the House of Commons in the 2004 federal election. He was selected by party leader and Prime Minister Paul Martin as a "star candidate" in the Toronto riding of York Centre, then considered a safe Liberal riding.

Dryden was elected by a margin of over 11,000 votes. He was named to Cabinet as Minister of Social Development. He made headlines on February 16, 2005, as the target of a remark by Conservative Member of Parliament Rona Ambrose who said about Dryden, "working women want to make their own choices, we don't need old white guys telling us what to do." Ambrose made the remarks after Dryden commented on a poll that analyzed child care choices by Canadian families. Dryden won generally favourable reviews for his performance in Cabinet.

Dryden was re-elected in the 2006 federal election, while the Liberals were defeated and Paul Martin resigned the party leadership. Interim party and opposition leader Bill Graham named Dryden to his shadow cabinet as health critic.

Dryden's margin of victory in York Centre dwindled in the 2006 and 2008 elections. In the 2011 federal election, he focused his efforts on his own re-election instead of campaigning for other candidates as he did in the past, and he received a visit from former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien. Still, Dryden lost his seat to Conservative candidate Mark Adler by nearly 6,000 votes.

Leadership bid
On April 28, 2006, Dryden announced that he would run for the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada, which would be choosing a successor to Paul Martin at a convention in Montreal on December 2, 2006.

A poll found that Dryden's potential pool of support exceeded that of his opponents, due mainly to his former NHL career. His fundraising fell well below that of top leadership contenders (Michael Ignatieff, Gerard Kennedy, Stéphane Dion and Bob Rae). A variety of media pundits criticized his ponderous speaking style and limited French. Supporters argued that few people were strongly opposed to him and that if he ran he could attract more support on later ballots as a consensus candidate.

At the convention, Dryden came in fifth place on the first ballot with 238 delegates, 4.9% of the vote. On the second ballot, he came in last place with 219 votes (4.7%) and was eliminated. He initially threw his support to Bob Rae, but after Rae was eliminated in the third ballot and released all of his delegates, Dryden endorsed Stéphane Dion, who went on to win the leadership.

According to Elections Canada filings, as of 2013 Dryden's campaign still owed $225,000.

Personal life
Ken is the son of Margaret and Murray Dryden. Dryden and his wife Lynda have two children and four grandchildren. He is a first cousin, twice removed, of Murray Murdoch, another former NHL player and a longtime coach of Yale University's hockey team, and Andrew Dryden Blair, who played on the 1931-32 Leafs Stanley Cup winning team. There is another distant relationship with the Apps family, Syl Apps also served in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, serving as Minister of Correctional Services, and his father's uncle, John C. Dryden, was Treasurer in the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba. His older brother Dave also played in the NHL and the WHA as a goalie, from 1961 to 1980.

Non-fiction

 * Face-Off at the Summit (1973)
 * The Game (1983)
 * Home Game: Hockey and Life in Canada (with Roy MacGregor, 1990)
 * In School: Our Kids, Our Teachers, Our Classrooms (with Roy MacGregor, 1995)
 * The Moved and the Shaken (1993)
 * Becoming Canada (2010)
 * Game Change (2017)
 * Scotty: A Hockey Life Like No Other (2019)
 * The Class: A memoir of a time, a place, and us (2022)

Awards and honors
Dryden's hockey awards and honours are numerous and include:

Dryden does not have a substantive doctorate, but has received honorary doctoral degrees from several universities, including:

title: Ken Dryden