Ghulām Aḥmad, Mīrzā - Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE
[Article]
Friedmann, Yohanan
Leiden
Brill
(1,736 words)
Mīrzā Ghulām Aḥmad (late 1830s-1908) was the founder and first leader of the Aḥmadiyya movement in Islam. He was born in the Panjābī village of Qādiyān. For his biography we depend mostly on his own accounts, supplemented by the extensive biographies written by some leading members of the movement. This material has a distinct hagiographical tinge and strives to depict Ghulām Aḥmad's birth and childhood in a way compatible with his later spiritual claim. Much of it is therefore relevant to the analysis of the religious outlook of