Encyclopedia of Islam

Ahmadiyya

  

23  J

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be more than 10 million members worldwide, but 

this figure is disputed. Followers claim that their 

numbers are growing.

Ahmadiyya members believe that Ghulam 

Ahmad was a religious renewer sent by God 

because the religion of Islam was thought to have 

gone into decline during the 19th century. Like 

other Muslims, they consider the q

Uran

 to be 

their holy book and have promoted its translation 

into many languages. They also practice the F

ive

p

illars

 of Islam. However, what has made the 

movement especially controversial are assertions 

made by Ghulam Ahamad and his followers that 

other Muslims are unbelievers (kafirs) and that 

Ghulam Ahmad is a prophet, a promised redeemer 

(

mahdi

), a Christlike messiah, and an incarnation 

of the Hindu god Krishna. Some Christians and 

Hindus, along with many Muslims, have objected 

to these beliefs, and the movement was attacked 

and persecuted by other Islamic groups and con-

servative religious authorities in India and later 

in  p

akistan

. As a consequence, the Ahmadiyya 

experienced internal division into the Qadiani and 

Lahori branches in 1914.

The larger Qadiani branch of the Ahmadiyya 

believes that it represents the only true Islam. It 

emphasizes belief in the prophethood of Ghulam 

Ahmad and the 

aUthority

 of his successors, who 

carry the title of 

caliph

. After the 1947 partition 

and independence of India and Pakistan, it moved 

its headquarters to Rabwa, Pakistan. The fourth 

caliph, Mirza Tahir Ahmad (d. 2003), moved the 

Ahmadiyya headquarters to London in the 1980s 

because of heightened opposition faced in Paki-

stan. The present caliph is his son Mirza Masroor 

Ahmad (b. 1950), the great grandson of Ghulam 

Ahmad. The Lahori branch is more moderate in 

its outlook, affirming Ghulam Ahmad’s role as a 

renewer, but it no longer regards him as a prophet. 

It also identifies with the wider Muslim commu-

nity more readily than does the Qadiani branch. 

Public riots and opposition by Sunni Muslim 

groups led to an amendment to the Pakistani 

constitution that declared Ahmadiyya members to 

be non-Muslims in 1974, followed by an official 

government ban on group activities in 1984. The 

name Ahmadiyya has also been used by several 

Sufi groups, especially that of the Egyptian saint 

a

hmad

 

al

-b

adaWi

 (ca. 1200–76).

See also  c

hristianity

 

and

  i

slam

;  h

indUism

and

  i

slam

; 

prophets

 

and

 

prophecy

; 

reneWal

 

and

reForm

 

movements

.