Yes — there’s a well-known moral parable that matches what you’re describing, though it exists in a few variations.

The most common version is an Islamic story about the prophet Abraham (Ibrahim). In it, Abraham is being thrown into a huge fire as a punishment for rejecting idol worship. While the fire is raging, all the animals are fleeing except a small ant.

The ant repeatedly carries a tiny drop of water (or sometimes just a bit of moisture in its mouth) toward the fire. When asked why it’s doing something so insignificant, it replies along the lines of:

“I know I cannot put out the fire, but I want to do my part.”

In some retellings, another creature responds that the ant’s effort is pointless, but the ant insists that it is acting according to its ability and intention.

The moral is usually interpreted as:

• Do what you can, even if it seems small
• Intent and effort matter, not just scale or outcome
• Refusing to help because you can’t solve everything is still a form of inaction

There are also similar modern retellings where the ant’s action symbolizes persistence in the face of overwhelming problems.

If you want, I can trace where this story comes from historically and whether it appears in classical sources or is more of a later folk parable.

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This particular ant-and-fire story is best understood as a later moral folk parable rather than a firmly attested classical text in major early sources.

Here’s the breakdown:

1. In early Islamic primary sources

In the canonical hadith collections (like Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī, Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, etc.), and in the earliest widely cited Qur’anic commentaries, there is no well-known authentic narration that explicitly features:

• an ant carrying water to Abraham’s fire, or
• an ant attempting to extinguish the fire in that manner.

The story of Abraham being thrown into the fire is present in the Qur’an (notably in Surah Al-Anbiya 21:68–69), but the ant episode is not part of the Qur’anic narrative itself.

2. Where the ant story likely comes from

The parable appears in later tafsir traditions, devotional literature, and moral storytelling collections, often used to illustrate themes like sincerity, effort, and intention.

It is also very likely influenced by:

• broader Near Eastern folk storytelling traditions
• later homiletic (sermon-style) expansions of Qur’anic narratives
• Sufi-influenced moral allegory literature, where small creatures often symbolize humble but meaningful action

Because of this, you’ll often see it retold in modern sermons, motivational writing, and children’s stories rather than in rigorously sourced early texts.

3. Its status among scholars

Most careful scholars and historians would classify it as:

• not reliably traceable to an authentic early chain of narration
• a didactic parable (useful morally, but not historically grounded in scripture or strong hadith)

So its authority is ethical/literary rather than textual/historical.

4. Why it persists

Even without strong classical sourcing, it remains popular because it communicates a very resilient idea:

value lies in intention and effort, even when outcomes seem impossible.

That message fits comfortably within broader Islamic ethical concepts like niyyah (intention), which is why it gets repeated and adapted.

If you want, I can also show you closely related authentic hadith or Qur’anic principles that carry the same moral idea, which is often where this parable draws its legitimacy from indirectly.