Rendering unto Caesar: Receptions of the Bible as a source for secularism

In this article, I identify a key trend for demarcating the “secular” as a Western, Christian achievement. I analyze how the New Testament story often known as “Render unto Caesar” is referenced as a source for the secular West, particularly in writings by European and American conservative thinkers in the 1990s and early 2000s. My argument is that these references to “Render unto Caesar” constitute a reception of the Bible that reinforces what the classicist Clare Foster has described as recognition capital. The reference functions as an almost emptied signifier, relying on little to no knowledge of, or familiarity with, the Bible. Anyone who can claim Jesus’s words about rendering to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s as part of their tradition can celebrate their secular modern accomplishments, while anyone who cannot, are left outside as lacking a scriptural foundation for the secular.