Much has been written about the religion and politics of Gulliver's Travels, particularly in relation to Part I, A Journey to Lilliput. Of all the travels and peoples that Gulliver, the protagonist of the novel, encounters during his many adventures, religion plays the most important, albeit superficial, role in Lilliput. This essay seeks to identify and analyze the nature of this role, its relationship to Lilliputian politics, and the satirical implications of that relationship. The significance of this question lies in its potential contribution to the contemporary understanding of early European discourse on secularization, where Gulliver's Travels plays a noteworthy role in that discourse. Furthermore, by presenting an alternative reading, this essay challenges conventional interpretations of Lilliputian religious history, namely that it “is a general fable about the futility of fighting over opinions in religion” (Lock 97) and “highlights the senseless disputes between sects on non-essential things." "(145). It will be argued here that the Lilliputian religious schism specifically satirizes those religious differences with political origins, thus implying that secularization is a favorable solution to such schisms. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why the should violent video games not be banned"? Get an original essay Before we delve into an in-depth explanation of Part I of Gulliver's Travels, it is imperative that the arguments of this essay are first contextualized. The purpose of the following observations on eighteenth-century Britain is to provide an intellectual precedent for the findings of this essay, and thus demonstrate the plausibility of such a reading. Furthermore, as stated in the introduction, the purpose of this article is to suggest that Gulliver's Travels plays a notable role in the primitive discourses on secularization; therefore, connecting the essay's analysis with contemporary intellectual influences is imperative. Eighteenth-century Britain was characterized by the most politically connected religious feuds. Undoubtedly such feuds arose from the British political system, in which the sovereign was the head of the Church. As a result, the Anglican Church developed as a body politic. Just as centuries before, during this period, the main religious rivalries were with Catholics and Protestants, with the latter rivaling due to their political dominance and persecution of the former (Black 125). Furthermore, the policy was a tool to impose Anglican hegemony on Catholics and dissenters. This was achieved in several ways, including the replacement of Catholic officials and landowners with Protestants; the Banishment Act of 1697, which drove bishops and clergy from Ireland; and the ban on mixed marriages (125). In England, sectarianism – and particularly Anglicanism against dissent – ​​had a much more egalitarian manifestation as it took a political form in the Whig-Tory struggles (131). Whether the religious elements of such feuds were the result of differences in the essential or subsidiary branches of Christianity is a question beyond the scope of this article. What should be deduced from the above summary is the prevalence of sectarianism perpetuated by political power. Against the backdrop of the political-religious turmoil of the 18th century, a distinct intellectual trend developed best exemplified in the works of the English philosopher John Locke, advocating a secular contractual political system (Sambrook 87). Such ideas were promulgated in Locke's A Letter Concerning Toleration (1689), published more than 35 years before the composition of Gulliver's Travels (1726), and thus available during thecomposition of the latter. Tolerance was a clear call for the separation of church and state. The main point of Locke's argument was that to preserve both the religious and political interests (of the Commonwealth), it was imperative that the two distinct authorities be separated. Furthermore, the proliferation of schisms, he argued, was due primarily to a conflict of interests “between those who have, or at least pretend to have, on the one hand, a concern for the interest of the souls of men, and, on the other hand , a cure of the Commonwealth” (Locke 118). Therefore, Locke argued that the British political system of his time was structurally prone to religious schisms. Furthermore, the above passage suggests his belief that such schisms, at least in some cases, were not the result of honest intellectual activity, but rather of pretentious political leaders seeking to achieve the interests of the commonwealth under the guise of religiosity . It is on this premise that this article provides its unique reading of Gulliver's Travels. It will be argued here that the Lilliputian egg schism is the manifestation of a structural conflict inherent in the Lilliputian monarchy which pretends to have, on the one hand, a concern for the interest of the souls of the Lilliputians, and on the other, a concern for the Commonwealth . Through various creative methods, Gulliver's Travels indicates that the Lilliputian Egg Schism is essentially politically motivated. It is therefore a secular schism dressed in an ascetic mantle. This is implied both structurally and contextually. First, the text juxtaposes the "two mighty evils" (Swift 42)—that is, high heels and low heels and Big- and Little-Endian conflicts by mentioning the two conflicts in the same paragraph, thus linking them in the reader's mind. . Furthermore, the two distinct conflicts are paralleled, both in cause and effect, in the historical account of Reldresal, the principal secretary of private affairs, who explains that both conflicts arise from different levels of adherence to tradition. High heels, because they are “very pleasing to the ancient [Lilliputian] Constitution,” are practically excluded from government (42). Similarly, Big-Endians have been persecuted due to their strict adherence to traditional religious interpretations (43). Furthermore, we are told that the effects of the two schisms are also essentially the same. Despite the obvious differences in severity, in both cases a policy of exclusion imposed by the dominant group suppressed the nastier of the two. The Secretary tells us that the King “has resolved to use only low heels in the administration of the government” (42); and as for Big-Endians, they have been “rendered by law to hold employment”; furthermore their “Books… have long been forbidden” (43). Thus, this juxtaposition serves to structurally or visually secularize the seemingly religious schism. In identifying the true causes of the Egg Schism, it is helpful to resolve the text's implicit emphasis on the gross gap between cause and effect. This gap, and its implications for the reader, can be seen as analogous to a defendant claiming in court that his killing spree was triggered by the loss of the express bus: anyone hearing such an outrageous claim will immediately assume that he owes be a more powerful man. cause due to the magnitude of the effect. Likewise, the text's implicit claims about the gross banality of religious schism, when juxtaposed with its great destructive effects, leave the reader searching for an unstated alternative cause. This cause appears to be represented by the secular ambitions of the Lilliputian monarch, which are pretentiously perpetuated and all the more banal in pursuitof political autonomy and hegemony. Therefore, this explanation serves to fill the “logical gap” produced by Gulliver's satirical account of Lilliputian history. This point is further reinforced by the text's implicit suggestions about the banality of the schism, thus strengthening the unstated cause. For example, Reldresal suggests that the question of breaking the egg is a “fundamental doctrine of [the] great prophet Lustrog, in the 54th chapter of the Brundrecal” (43). When examined closely, this statement satirizes the expressed fundamentality of the doctrine. That is, the suggested meaning of the doctrine is refuted in the same clause by saying that it is found in the fifty-fourth chapter. How important can a doctrine be if it is mentioned only once and so late in the text? Once again, a probable solution to fill this "logical gap" is the hypothesis that the Lilliputian political authorities, on which the religious authority also depends, have amplified and perpetuated this banality for political purposes, such as justifying imperial aggression against the rival empire, in the name of supporting divine laws. Even if the persecution of the Lilliputian monarch is taken literally and therefore considered a struggle of a purely religious nature, their application of the above scriptural passage reveals their ulterior political motives of asserting political dominance for secular goals. This suggestion is made through an apology clause that follows the Secretary's "official" interpretation of the verse in question: he tells Gulliver that insisting on breaking the egg on the large part is "a meer (sic) strain on the text: for the words are these; That all true Believers will break their Eggs at the convenient End: and what the convenient End is, seems... to be left to every Man's Conscience, or at least to the Power of their chief Magistrate to determine" ( 43). The secretary is effectively saying that Lilliputian political authority prevails over scriptural and religious authority. This passage contains one of the clearest indications that the monarch's obsession with the Egg Schism is rooted in his desire to assert the " power of their chief magistrate" and not in any interest in upholding a true, scripturally sound religious orthodoxy. This revelation undermines interpretations such as those presented in the introduction, according to which the Lilliputian story is a satire on religious controversies and conflicts over trivialities. Rather, in addition to asserting the absurdity of schisms over religious platitudes, satire identifies its sources and motivations in the secular realm, thus rendering religious platitudes secular. Finally, the political or secular reasons for the schism are shown through the convenient religiosity of the monarch. The question of religion is absent from the discussions and descriptions of Lilliput and the Lilliputians throughout Part I, except for the last pages of Chapter Four. At first glance, this omission seems irrelevant; however, this seemingly trivial fact is indicative of the monarch's religiosity of convenience. To summarize, religion is irrelevant to state governance in religious or even secular matters, except when it can conveniently serve secular goals. More specifically, the reader is informed of the Lilliputian religion only when such information is a necessary means for Redresal to convince Gulliver to aid the empire in its imperial efforts against "two mighty Evils". If true religiosity is absent in the political sphere in matters unrelated to imperial interests, such as those covered in chapters one to three, then it seems suspicious that they will only suddenly gain primacy when land, money, and power are at stake. Therefore, Gulliver's Travels is in fact more of a satire of schisms.