Opium of the people
"Opium of the people" or "opium of the masses" (German: Opium des Volkes) is a dictum used in reference to religion, derived from a frequently paraphrased partial statement of German revolutionary and critic of political economy Karl Marx: "Religion is the opium of the people." In context, the statement is part of Marx's analysis that religion's role is as a metaphysical balm for the real suffering in the universe and in society. This statement was translated from the German original, "Die Religion [...] ist das Opium des Volkes" and is often rendered as "religion [...] is the opiate of the masses." The passage from Marx translates (including italics) as: "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.