“Render Unto Caesar The Things That Are Caesar’s”

In A World Where Political Philosophy Intertwines With The Sociology Of Knowledge, And The International Order Is Reshaped Based On Preconceived Civilizational Perceptions, Historical And Religious Texts Are Rarely Just Fleeting Words. Rather, Over Time And Under The Guidance Of Specific Elites, They Transform Into Strategic Tools Used To Draw Boundaries Between The Civilizational “Self” And The “Other”. In This Complex Context Comes The Important Research Paper By Researcher Hannah M. Strømmen From Lund University In Sweden, Published In 2025 In The Journal “Critical Research On Religion”, Under The Significant Title: “Rendering To Caesar What Is Caesar’s: Receptions Of The Bible As A Source Of Secularism”.

In This Paper, Strømmen Presents A Bold And Profound Thesis, Dismantling The Contemporary Western Narrative That Monopolizes The Concept Of “Secularism” And Portrays It As An Authentic Western Christian Achievement. Perhaps The Importance Of This Review Lies In Its Ability To Dissect How Sacred Texts Are Politicized, Specifically The Famous New Testament Quote Attributed To Christ: “Render Therefore Unto Caesar The Things Which Are Caesar’s; And Unto God The Things That Are God’s”, To Achieve Geopolitical And Cultural Goals In The Post-Cold War Era, Especially In Confronting The Islamic World.

The Engineering Of The “Other”: The Geopolitical Context Of The 1990s And Beyond

To Understand The Deep Roots Of This Phenomenon, The Researcher Takes Us To A Pivotal Era In The History Of Modern International Relations: The 1990s And The First Decade Of The Twenty-First Century. This Temporal Choice Was Not Random; With The Collapse Of The Soviet Union And The End Of The Cold War, The West Lost The Eastern “Other” Represented By The Communist Bloc, Through Which It Defined Its Identity By Contrast. Amidst This Strategic Vacuum, The Need Arose To Forge A New “Other”, And Islam Was The Most Prominent Candidate To Occupy This Position In The Western Narrative.

Strømmen Points Out That This Period Witnessed An Unprecedented Intensification Of Discussions About The Relationship Between “The West” And “Islam”. This Trend Clearly Crystallized In Major Strategic And Intellectual Theorizations, Such As Historian Bernard Lewis’s Article “The Roots Of Muslim Rage” In 1990, And Political Scientist Samuel Huntington’s “Clash Of Civilizations” Thesis, Which Appeared As An Article In 1993 And Then As A Book In 1996. These Theses Did Not Merely Draw Lines Of Political Contact, But Rather Established What Could Be Called “Wars Of Civilizational Identity”, Which Reached Their Peak After The September 11, 2001 Attacks, A Moment Described As A Defining Turning Point In Global Politics.

In This Tense Context, A Fundamental Question Emerged About The Nature Of The “Western Achievement” That Must Be Defended. Here, The Phrase “Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s” Was Invoked Intensively And Repeatedly By Conservative American And European Thinkers. This Biblical Quote Was Portrayed As The First And Unique Seed That Separated Temporal Authority (Politics) And Spiritual Authority (Religion), Paving The Way For The Emergence Of Secularism And Democracy In Europe And America, In Stark Contrast To Islam, Which Is Accused Of Merging Religion And State.

The Text As An “Emptied Signifier”: The Manufacture Of Cognitive Capital

The Researcher Dives Into The Depths Of The Sociology Of Knowledge To Dismantle The Mechanism By Which This Quote Operates. She Relies On Highly Important Analytical Concepts. The First Concept Is “Recognition Capital”, Formulated By Classical Studies Researcher Clare Foster. This Concept Argues That Repeatedly Referring To A Specific Classical Text In A Certain Way Creates A State Of “Familiarity” And Automatic Recognition Of Its Value And Authority, Without The Need To Return To The Original Text Or Its Historical Context.

The Second Concept Is The Transformation Of The Text Into An “Emptied Signifier”, A Metaphor From Anya Topolski’s Analysis Of The Term “Judeo-Christian”. What Strømmen Concludes Is That The Use Of The Phrase “Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s” In Conservative Western Discourse Has Nothing To Do With Theological Understanding Or Deep Biblical Exegesis Of The New Testament. Quite The Contrary, This Quote Works With Maximum Efficiency Precisely Because It Has Been Emptied Of Its Historical And Religious Context, Becoming A Mere Political Slogan Or A Civilizational “Brand”.

The Researcher Clarifies That These Conservative Thinkers Do Not Care About The Complexities Of Interpretation Surrounding This Text In The Gospels (Matthew, Mark, And Luke). The Original Text Speaks Of The Attempt By The Pharisees And Herodians To Entrap Christ By Asking Him About The Permissibility Of Paying Tribute To The Roman Caesar. Neither Christ Nor His Contemporaries In The Ancient World Had Any Conception Of The Modern Concept Of “Secularism” Or The Institutional Separation Between Church And State As We Know It Today, As Scholars Of The Ancient World Have Proven That Distinguishing Between “Religion” And “Politics” Is An Anachronistic Historical Projection.

However, This Very Short Quote Is Continually Invoked And Repeated As A Solid Foundational Rule. This Repetition—As Clare Foster Emphasizes—Is Not Innocent Or Neutral At All. It Is A Strategic Performance Aimed At Consolidating The Narrative Of Civilizational Superiority; Whoever Possesses This Text Within Their Heritage (i.e., The Christian West) Can Celebrate Their Modern Secular Achievements, And Whoever Lacks It In Their Sacred Texts (i.e., Islam And The Quran) Is Left Outside, Backward, And Lacking The Textual Basis That Allows Them To Evolve Towards Secularism.

The Engineers Of The Civilizational Clash: How Did The Text Turn Into A Geopolitical Doctrine?

In This Part Of Our Analytical Reading Of The Exceptional Research Paper Presented By Hannah M. Strømmen, We Move From The Theoretical Framework And The Sociology Of Knowledge To Practical Application. How Was The Phrase “Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s” Employed To Culturally Shape The Structure Of The International Order? Strømmen Traces The Crystallization Of This Narrative By Tracking The Works Of An Elite Group Of Conservative Thinkers, Historians, And Political Scientists, Whose Writings Formed What Resembles A “Foundational Manifesto” For The Western Mindset In Its Dealings With The Islamic World During The Post-Cold War Era.

The Analytical Thread Begins With The Prominent British-American Historian Bernard Lewis, Specifically In His Famous Article “The Roots Of Muslim Rage” Published In The Atlantic Magazine In 1990. Lewis Argues That The Idea Of Separating Religion From Politics, Despite Being Considered Relatively Modern, Has Deep Roots Going Back To The Very Beginnings Of Christianity, Citing The Gospel Text That Urges Christians To “Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s And Unto God What Is God’s”. This Interpretation, According To Lewis, Established The Legitimacy Of The Existence Of Two Parallel Institutions: The Church And The State.

From This Theological Point, Lewis Departs To Build A Global Strategic Vision. He Sees That The Islamic World, In Contrast, Did Not Witness This Secular Evolution; Muhammad Was Not Only A Prophet, But Also A Ruler, A Soldier, And A Head Of State, Which Made The Intertwining Between The Religious And The Political An Organic Matter In Islam. Consequently, Lewis Interprets Islamic Hostility Towards The West As A “War Against Secularism”, And Since The United States Is The Legitimate Heir To European Civilization, It Inherited This Rage Targeting A “Judeo-Christian” Heritage And A Secular Present.

Lewis’s Thesis Was Nothing But The Cornerstone Upon Which American Political Scientist Samuel Huntington Built His More Widely Spread Theory Of The “Clash Of Civilizations”, Whether In His 1993 Article Or His 1996 Book. Huntington Divides The World Into Distinct Civilizations Based On Cultural And Religious Foundations, Making Religion The Fundamental Difference Between Them. In His Quest To Define The “Western Exception”, Huntington Places The Duality Between Spiritual And Temporal Authority As One Of The Most Important Pillars Of Western Civilization.

Huntington Borrows, Brilliantly And Concisely, The Biblical Slogan, To Decide That The Distinction Between “God And Caesar” Was A Prevailing Duality In Western Culture, While In Islam “God Is Caesar”. Despite Huntington’s Acknowledgment Of The Decline Of Religious Practice In Europe, He Insists That Christian Concepts And Values Still Permeate European Civilization. For Him, This Separation Between The Realms Of God And Caesar Is The Western Christian Concept That Contributes Immeasurably To The Development Of Freedom, And It Stands In Radical Opposition To The Concept Of Islam As A Way Of Life That Unites Religion And Politics. Strømmen Notes Here That Huntington Uses The Biblical Text As A Passing And Truncated Quote, Without Any Attempt To Dive Into Its Theological Meanings, Contenting Himself With Employing It As A Quick Tool (Shorthand) To Prove The Penetration Of Christian Values Into Western Secularism.

European Philosophy And The Rooting Of The “Western Exception”

This Cognitive Engineering Was Not Limited To The American Bank Of The Atlantic, But Extended To Find A Deep Echo In Conservative European Philosophy, Which Sought To Consolidate European Identity In The Face Of The Transformations Of The International Order. Here, The Contributions Of The Conservative French Philosopher Rémi Brague Stand Out In His Book “Europe, The Roman Way” (Published In 1992, And Translated Into English Under The Title Eccentric Culture: A Theory Of Western Civilization).

Brague Is Preoccupied With Searching For The “Essence” Of Europe, Refusing To Consider European Identity A Natural Given, But Rather A Flexible Cultural Reality Formed In Its Distinction From The “Other”. Brague Believes That What Gives Europe And Christianity Their Uniqueness Is The Ability To Distinguish Between The Spiritual And The Temporal, Quoting Explicitly And Directly The Words Of Christ About “The Necessity That We Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s, And Unto God What Is God’s” (Matthew 22:17). This Emergence Of The “Worldly” Or “Secular” Realm, As Brague Analyzes, Is A Direct Product Of The Christian Idea Of Incarnation, Which Was Completely Absent From The Islamic World.

In The Same Vein, The Conservative British Philosopher And Thinker Roger Scruton Engages In This Foundational Debate Through His Two Books “Modern Culture” (1998) And “The West And The Rest” (2002). Scruton Presents A Historical Narrative In Which He Strongly Connects The Biblical Heritage And The Emergence Of Secularism, Considering That Western Civilization Originated From A Religious Belief And A Sacred Text, Before Moving Into The Space Of Doubt And Open Discussion.

Scruton Places Strict Boundaries Between The West, Which Is “Governed By Politics”, And The Rest Of The World, Which Is “Governed By Power”. He Asserts That The Christian Religion, Thanks To Examples Such As The Story Of The Tribute Money And St. Paul’s Use Of Roman Law, Encouraged Secular Legal Organization That Does Not Claim Divine Authority. In His Book Following The September 11 Attacks, Scruton Launches An Explicit Attack On Islam, Claiming That The Quran Does Not Separate The Public And Private Spheres, And Since “Everything Is Owed To God, The Result Is That Nothing Is Owed To Caesar”. Scruton Contrasts This With The Western Vision Where There Is National Sovereignty And Secular Law, Which Is A Christian Legacy That Entrenched The “Ideal Of Secular Government”, Contradicting Radically With The Quran In Which Divine Commands Establish The Legal System.

Thus, The Paper Reveals How An Ancient And Complex Christian Theology Was Transformed Into An Exclusive Title Deed For Secularism, Used To Draw Cognitive And Political Maps That Separate A Western Civilization Possessing In Its Seeds A Text Allowing It To Evolve, And An Islamic Civilization Portrayed As A Captive Of A Text That Prevents It From Grasping Modernity.

From The Academic Elite To The Masses: The Biblical Text In Populist Discourse

If The Corridors Of Philosophy And Political Science Had Undertaken The Laying Of The First Theoretical Bricks For The Myth Of The “Western Exception” Through The Employment Of The Gospel Text, This Narrative Soon Left Its Ivory Towers To Sweep The Public Space And Popular Culture. In This Part Of Our Reading Of Hannah M. Strømmen’s Paper, We Trace How The Quote “Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s” Transformed From An Analytical Tool In The Articles Of Bernard Lewis And Samuel Huntington, Into A Sharp Ideological Weapon In The Hands Of Mass Sociologists, Widely Circulated Journalists, And Controversial Public Figures. The Goal Was Clear: Transforming This Theological Saying Into A “Geopolitical Doctrine” Sold To Millions Of Readers Around The World, To Justify The Superiority Of The West And Entrench The Fear Of Islam.

Capitalism, Reason, And The Victory Of The West: Rodney Stark’s Approach

The Researcher Stops At The Prominent American Sociologist Rodney Stark, And His 2006 Book Entitled “The Victory Of Reason: How Christianity Led To Freedom, Capitalism, And Western Success”. This Book Represents A Qualitative Shift In The Employment Of The Narrative; Stark Leaves His Strict Academic Trench In Sociology To Write For The “General Reader”, Aiming To Draw A Grand Mural Of The History Of “Western Culture”.

In This Work, Christianity Is Not Reduced To Being Merely A Religion, But Is Presented As The First And Sole Engine Of Capitalism And Rationality. As Is Customary In This Series Of Literature, The Bright Western “Self” Image Is Not Complete Without Invoking The Dark “Other”, Which Here Is Islam. Stark Quotes Bernard Lewis’s Ideas To Emphasize That Prophet Muhammad Was Not Just A Prophet But A Head Of State, Which Made Islam A Religion That “Idealizes The Fusion Of Religion And Political Rule”.

Conversely, And With A Quick And Fleeting Narrative Movement, Stark Credits The Idea Of Separating The Church From The State To Christ Personally, Invoking That Same Magical Text: “Render Therefore Unto Caesar The Things Which Are Caesar’s; And Unto God The Things That Are God’s”. Stark Explains This Early Secular Trend Partly By The Fact That Christianity Began As A Persecuted And Marginalized Minority, Forcing It To Adapt And Develop A Safe Distance Between Itself And Political Authority. Here, We Clearly See How The Quote Is Employed As A Cornerstone To Build An Entire Civilizational Edifice, Without Stopping For A Moment To Question The Historical Context Of The Text In The First Century AD, Or The Theological Complexities That Surrounded Its Interpretation Over Two Thousand Years.

Oriana Fallaci And The “Eurabia” Phobia: The Text As A Brand

From Sociological Theorizing In America, Strømmen Takes Us To The Other Bank Of The Atlantic, Where The Discourse Takes On A Sharper, More Populist, And Dramatic Character At The Hands Of The Highly Famous Italian Journalist Oriana Fallaci. Fallaci Was Not An Academic, But A Roaring Journalistic Voice Who Dedicated Her Final Years To Warning Against What She Called The “Islamization Of Europe”. Through Her Best-Selling Books “The Rage And The Pride” (2001) And “The Force Of Reason” (2004), Fallaci Played A Pivotal Role In Promoting The Conspiracy Theory Known As “Eurabia”, Which Claims The Existence Of A Malicious Demographic And Cultural Plan To Subjugate Europe Culturally And Religiously In Favor Of Muslims.

Despite Fallaci’s Declaration Of Her Atheism, Describing Herself As A “Christian Atheist”, She Vigorously Draws Inspiration From Christianity As The “Essence” Of Western Civilization That Must Be Protected From “Pollution”. Fallaci Launches A Scathing Attack On The Contemporary Church Institution, But At The Same Time She Celebrates The Figures Of Christ And St. Paul As The Inspirers Of Secularism.

Perhaps The Most Blatant And Telling Expression Of The Transformation Of The Sacred Text Into An “Emptied Signifier” And A Consumer Slogan Is The Way Fallaci Phrased The Biblical Saying. She Wrote It In A Long Hyphenated Series: “Render-Unto-Caesar-What-Belongs-To-Caesar-And-Unto-God-What-Belongs-To-God”. This Strange Typographical Formation Does Not Reflect A Religious Text Whose Meanings Are Contemplated, But Rather Mimics A Magic Spell, A Political Slogan, Or Even An Identity Code That Distinguishes The Secular Western Citizen From The Muslim “Invaders” Lying In Wait For Their Civilization.

Science, Civilization, And The Open Trial: Ferguson And Hirsi Ali

The Wheel Of Cloning This Text Did Not Stop With Fallaci. In The Following Decade, Specifically In 2011, The Highly Influential Scottish Historian Niall Ferguson Published His Book “Civilization: The West And The Rest”. Ferguson Seeks To Explain The Exceptional Western Hegemony, Linking The Scientific Revolution And The Enlightenment On One Hand, And The “Fundamental Christian Principle Stating The Necessity Of Separating Church From State” On The Other Hand.

Ferguson Places The Quote From Matthew (22:21) In Direct And Sharp Confrontation With The Quran, Claiming That The Quranic Verse Insists On “The Indivisibility Of God’s Law As Revealed To The Prophet, And The Unity Of Any Power Structure Based On Islam”. As A Result Of This Fundamental Difference In “Foundational Texts”, Ferguson Interprets The “Scientific Backwardness” In The Ottoman Empire And The Islamic World By The “Absolute Sovereignty Of Religion”, Presenting A Reductionist Narrative That Ignores Centuries Of Islamic Scientific Prosperity And The Institutional Complexities Of Those Empires.

Strømmen Crowns Her Review Of These Models With The Dutch-American Public Figure Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Through Her Book “Heretic: Why Islam Needs A Reformation Now” Published In 2015. Hirsi Ali, Who Grew Up Muslim Before Apostatizing And Turning To Criticizing Religion (Then Later Converting To Christianity), Starts From The Premise That Political Violence Is Inherent In Islam As A Text And An Ideology.

Hirsi Ali Uses The Same Comparative Logic Adopted By Her Predecessors; Christianity, According To Her, Was “Shaped From Its Beginning To Coexist With States And Empires”, While Islam Sought “From The Beginning To Be The Church, The State, And The Empire”. To Confirm This Structural Difference, She Invokes Christ’s Principle Of The Necessity Of “Rendering Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s”, Considering It The Basis That Allowed Christians And Jews To Submit To Civil Laws That Differ From Their Religious Laws, In Contradiction To Islamic Sharia Which Derives Its Comprehensiveness From The Quran And Hadith.

Thus We See An Amazing Consensus Among These Writers, From The Early Nineties Until The Year 2015. None Of Them Cared To Present A Sober Theological Or Historical Interpretation Of The Text. The Saying Was Cloned And Repeated As An Absolute And Taken-For-Granted Truth, To Perform One Function: Acting As A Defining Mark, A Moral Compass, And An Irrefutable Argument Proving That Secularism Is A Pure Christian Legacy, And That Islam Is The Radical Antithesis Of This Civilizational Achievement.

Mechanisms Of Cognitive Forgery: Anachronism And The Erasure Of Europe’s Conflictual Memory

Researcher Hannah M. Strømmen Is Not Content In Her Paper With Monitoring The External Manifestations And Tracing The Names Of The Thinkers Who Circulated The Saying “Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s”, But She Moves To The Depth Of The Critical Process To Dissect The Internal Structure Of This Discourse. She Seeks To Answer A Crucial Methodological Question: How Does A Discourse Lacking Historical Accuracy And Theological Depth Succeed In Dominating The Contemporary Western Political Mind? The Researcher Reveals That This Domination Is Achieved Through Two Main Cognitive Strategies: The First Is “Deliberate Anachronism”, And The Second Is The “Systematic Erasure Of The Conflictual Historical Memory” In Europe.

The Illusion Of The “Foundational Text” And Historical Anachronism

Strømmen Clarifies That The First Of The Sins Of This Conservative Discourse Is Projecting Complex Modern Concepts Retroactively Onto An Ancient World Where Those Concepts Had Not Crossed Its Mind. When Christ’s Sentence About The Tribute Money To Caesar Is Invoked, The Thinkers—From Lewis To Hirsi Ali—Deal With It As If It Were A Constitutional Manifesto Issued By A Modern State Separating Powers.

However, Contemporary Critical Historical And Theological Studies, Cited By The Researcher, Confirm That The World Of The First Century AD In Palestine Under Roman Rule Did Not Know A Distinction Between What Is “Religious” And What Is “Political” In The Modern Sense. The Roman Caesar Was Not A Civil Secular Ruler, But Represented A Theocratic And Imperial Authority That Bestowed Upon Itself A Divine Or Semi-Divine Character, And The Demand To Pay Tribute Was Part Of An Integrated System Of Religious And Political Submission. Similarly, Christ’s Answer Did Not Establish The “Secularization Of The State”, But Was A Smart And Neutral Strategic Answer To Escape A Political Trap Set For Him By His Opponents.

Transforming This Contextual Text Into A “Genetic Seed” For Western Secularism Represents, In Strømmen’s View, A Kind Of “Blatant Anachronism”. This Paradox Works To Empty The Text Of Its Complex Historical Reality, And Recharge It As A Modern Ideological Concept Used Exclusively To Draw Cultural Boundaries Between West And East. Here The Concept Of “Recognition Capital” Manifests Itself; As The Text Becomes Familiar And Automatically Accepted By The Western Audience Not Because It Is Historically Correct, But Because Its Constant Repetition In The Media And Best-Selling Books Made It An “Axiomatic Truth” Unquestionable.

A History Without Blood: How Are Conflicts Erased From The Narrative Of The “Christian Gift”?

The Second And More Dangerous Strategy Dismantled By The Researcher Is The Process Of The “Sanitization Of History”. In The Narrative Promoted By Huntington, Scruton, And Stark, Secularism Appears As If It Were A Ripe Natural Fruit That Fell From The Tree Of Christianity Smoothly And Peacefully, As Soon As Europeans Read The Gospel Of Matthew. This Cognitive Reductionism Erases Long And Bitter Centuries Of Bloody Conflicts And Religious Wars That Ground The European Continent.

Strømmen Reminds Us Of The Historical Reality That These Thinkers Deliberately Ignore: Secularism In Europe Was Not A Gift From The Religious Text, But Was An Arduous And Blood-Stained Extraction Against The Authority Of The Church Institution That Continued For Centuries To Practice Totalitarian Theocratic Rule. Modern Secular Ideas, Human Rights, And Freedom Of Conscience Were Born From The Womb Of Suffering And Wars That Followed The Protestant Reformation Movement, Specifically The Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) That Tore Europe Apart, And The Struggles Of The Enlightenment And Violent Revolutionary Transformations Like The French Revolution.

Portraying Secularism As A Pure Christian Achievement, Stemming Directly From The Words Of Christ, Obscures The Fact That The Catholic Church And Orthodox And Protestant Religious Institutions Resisted Modernization, Secularization, And Democracy Fiercely For Long Centuries. Through This Systematic Erasure, Secularism Is Transformed From A Concept Generated Through A Complex And Conflictual Historical, Social, And Economic Becoming, Into A “Fixed Ethnic And Cultural Advantage” Rooted In The Foundational Texts Of The West.

Transcending Western Centrism: The Thesis Of “Multiple Secularities”

In The Final Part Of The Analytical Structure Of Her Paper, Strømmen Seeks To Present A Theoretical Alternative That Transcends This Suffocating Western Centrism. She Relies Here On The Thesis Of German Sociologist Of Religion Monika Wohlrab-Sahr And Christoph Kleine On “Multiple Secularities”.

This Thesis Argues That Secularism Is Not A Single Unique Model And A Globalized Formula That Everyone Must Emulate, Nor Is It A Monopoly Over A Specific Christian Historical Path. Rather, Secularism Consists Of “Structural And Institutional Responses” To The Problems And Challenges That Appear In Different Civilizational And Social Contexts, When It Requires Distinguishing Between Different Spheres Of Authority To Resolve Conflicts, Or To Manage Cultural Diversity, Or To Ensure State Stability.

Strømmen Clarifies, Based On This Framework, That The Distinction Between Political Authority And Spiritual Authority, Or Organizing The Relationship Between The Public And The Private, Is A Phenomenon That Can Be Monitored And Traced Historically In Different Civilizations Outside The European Christian Space, Including Islamic History Itself, And Asian Contexts Like China And Japan, Without The Need For The Existence Of A Gospel Text Legitimizing That. In Islamic History, For Example, There Were Wide And Practical Spaces For The Separation Between The Temporal Authority Of The Caliph Or Sultan (Politics And Governance) And The Authority Of Jurists And Scholars (Sharia And Fatwa), Which Is A Structural Distinction In Which The Practice Of Governance Was Differentiated From The Absolute Religious Reference In Many Historical Stations.

By Adopting The Concept Of “Multiple Secularities”, The Researcher Deals A Knockout Blow To The Claims Of Cultural Monopoly. She Reveals That Linking Secularism To The Quote “Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s” Is Not A Scientific Reading Of History, But Is A “Geopolitical Performance” Aimed At Isolating The Islamic World And Depriving It Of Its Qualification For Modernity, By Insisting That Secularism Requires “Christian Textual Genes” That It Does Not Possess.

The Myth Of The “Judeo-Christian Alliance”: Erasing Memory And Flattening History

Strømmen Pauses With Remarkable Critical Intelligence At The Problematics Of Using The Concept Of The “Judeo-Christian West”, Pointing Out That This Use Is Not Free From Deep Problematics; It Swallows The Jewish Religion And Melts It Inside Christianity, Leading To Their Forced Homogenization As If They Were One Identical Tradition. The Researcher Relies Here On The Analyses Of Anya Topolski Who Traced The Genealogy (History Of Formation) Of This Linguistic Signifier, To Reveal An Amazing Historical Paradox: The Term “Judeo-Christian” Was Used In Germany During The Nineteenth Century As A Negative Stigma To Indicate The Pollution Of Catholic Christianity And Its Being Influenced By Judaism, In Contrast To A Pauline (Protestant) Christianity That Was Claimed To Be Purer And Superior.

As For Today, And In The Twenty-First Century, This Signifier Has Been Completely Emptied Of Its Negative Historical Significance, To Be Recharged With Positive Meanings, But With A New Exclusionary Function Exclusively Targeting The Exclusion Of Muslims. This Contemporary Employment Works To “Flatten” Judaism And Transform It Into A Mere “Vague Prefix” Added To Christianity. Worse Than That, According To Strømmen, This Artificial Merging Is Used As A Convenient Smokescreen To Marginalize And Erase Centuries Of Anti-Judaism And Antisemitism That Marked Western History.

This Point Gains Double Importance When We Connect It To The History Of The Interpretation Of The Text “Render Unto Caesar What Is Caesar’s” Itself. Strømmen Points Out, Relying On Previous Studies, That Many Commentators In The Nineteenth Century Used This Text With An Anti-Jewish Tone, Where They Were Portrayed As Believing In The Possibility That God Could Rule Society, And Therefore They Are “Incapable Of Separating Between What Is Spiritual And What Is Worldly”. The Great Paradox Here Is That The Same Accusation—Which Was Used Historically In Europe To Stigmatize Jews And Exclude Them Under The Pretext Of Their Inability To Absorb Secularism—Has Been Recycled Today And Redirected Entirely Towards Muslims To Play The Role Of The “Other” Who Highlights The Identity Of The Christian Or Judeo-Christian West.

Towards A Liberated Cognitive Sociology In International Relations

Hannah M. Strømmen’s Paper Represents A Qualitative And Important Addition For Researchers In The Fields Of International Relations, Strategic Studies, And The Sociology Of Knowledge. It Exposes How Major Civilizational Narratives Are Manufactured, Not Through Objective Facts, But Through Directed Selection, Contextual Amputation, And Institutional Repetition That Transforms Ideology Into An “Axiomatic Truth”.

The Narrative That Monopolizes Secularism And Makes It An Exclusively Christian And Western Endowment, Based On A Truncated Saying Issued In The Context Of The Roman Empire, Is Not Merely An Academic Luxury Or An Error In Historiography. It Is A Tool Of Ideological Hegemony Used To Justify Exclusionary Policies, Feed Islamophobia, And Draw Maps Of Cultural And Geopolitical Conflict In Today’s World.

In Conclusion, This Reference Paper Invites Us To Exercise The Highest Degrees Of Critical Vigilance Towards Texts And Discourses That Appear “Axiomatic” In Global Political Culture. It Emphasizes That The Path To A More Balanced International Order, Accommodating Diverse Political Philosophies, Does Not Pass Through Monopolizing The Virtue Of Modernity And Arbitrarily Linking It To Specific Sacred Texts, But Passes Through Recognizing “Multiple Secularities”, And The Ability Of Different Civilizations To Forge Their Own Paths Towards Modernization, Without The Need To Wait For A Deed Of Forgiveness, Or A Seal Of Quality, From The “Caesar” Of The West And His Strategic Interpretations.