Quotation
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“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.”
Karl Marx · Historical materialism · Modern · 1844
What does it mean?
Religion, in the 1844 introduction, is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions, and then the opium of the people. Opium names relief and numbness together. A rival reading hears only the insult, and another, pious one, hears only the sympathy and drops the claim that the comfort leaves the harsh world standing. He is doing both. Quoting only the last clause is how the passage gets weaponised.
Did Karl Marx really say this?
The library’s label is Paraphrase or translation. Standard English of the 1844 introduction. The opium sentence is the last clause of a longer, less sneering passage. Quoting only 'opium of the people' cuts the lines in which he calls religion the heart of a heartless world.
Where it comes from
A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right, introduction
Approximate date: 1844.
How to use it
A zero-hours worker in Sheffield uses a Sunday service, or a brand, or a football club, to get through a week the contract makes punishing. Ask the double question the passage actually asks: what suffering is being expressed, and what does the comfort leave unchanged? Sneering at the comfort answers neither.
A mindset reading
The full sentence is harder to weaponise than the short one. That is a reason to prefer it. A view includes the clauses that complicate your side's banner, including this one.
Understand the philosophy
The introduction is early Marx, critical of religion as a clue to social conditions, not yet the later economics. Treat the opium line as part of that page. Do not treat it as a complete theory of belief, which he did not write there.
- society
- meaning
- mind
FAQ
What does it mean?
Religion, in the 1844 introduction, is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions, and then the opium of the people. Opium names relief and numbness together. A rival reading hears only the insult, and another, pious one, hears only the sympathy and drops the claim that the comfort leaves the harsh world standing. He is doing both. Quoting only the last clause is how the passage gets weaponised.
Did Karl Marx really say this?
Paraphrase or translation. Standard English of the 1844 introduction. The opium sentence is the last clause of a longer, less sneering passage. Quoting only 'opium of the people' cuts the lines in which he calls religion the heart of a heartless world.
Which work is it in?
A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right, introduction Approximate date: 1844.