Sūratu’l-Baqarah [The Cow] : (2:78)

وَمِنْهُمْ أُمِّيُّونَ لَا يَعْلَمُونَ الْكِتَابَ إِلَّا أَمَانِيَّ وَإِنْ هُمْ إِلَّا يَظُنُّونَ

Among them are the unlettered folk who do not know anything about the Book except fancies from hearsay, and they merely follow their conjectures. (Al-Baqarah 2:78)

This verse describes those who set their hearts on fantasies and utopias instead of the true religion throughout history.

▪In fact, Marxism, communism, and capitalism are based on such conjectures, fantasies, and utopias that have their source in escape from the religion.

▪Unfortunately, such history has repeated itself around these fancies; Jews were followed by Christians in wandering blindly on in such fancies and fantasies, and so were Christians followed by some Muslims.

▪Today Muslims, too, have been wavering in fantasies and misgivings which the Qur’ān describes as “amāniyy” (fancies from hearsay). The present conditions of Muslims are sufficient evidence of this fact.

God’s Messenger informs and warns us of this tragic reality in a hadīth mentioned in Sahīh al-Bukhārī, Sahīh Muslim, and Musnad Ahmad:

“You will go in the footsteps of the people before you, step by step, inch by inch. So that if they even go into the nest of a reptile, you will follow them.” When the Companions asked: “O Messenger of God! Are they Christians and Jews?”, the Prophet responded: “Who else can they be other than them?” (Bukhārī, Anbiyā’, 50; I’tisam, 14; Muslim, ‘Ilm, 6; Musnad Ahmad, 2/325, 327.)

The word amāniyy is the plural of umniyah, which means daydream, fancy, or utopia.

Even though it may be interpreted as idealism to some extent, it is actually nothing other than conjectures and flights of fancies that are impossible to realize. Although the actualization of some of them may appear to be possible, in general, almost all of them are empty and worthless. Consequently, those fancies are no more than illusions for those who have them and frustrations for those deceived by them.

If intellectuals in a community are unable to think soundly and produce well-grounded ideas and if inattentive and careless masses are blind followers of their fantasies, then it is inevitable that such a community gets lost in the net of impossibilities.