Christianity’s foundational role in shaping Western secularism, individual freedoms and political order sharply distinguishes it from Islam, which embodies a totalizing way of life, prohibiting critical thinking and without separation of religion and state.
Islam faces unique challenges in adapting to secular liberalism due to its integrated religious-political nature and the literalist understanding of the Quran.
“Essentially what Christianity has that Islam does not is a concept of the secular. Islam is a a totalizing way of leading your life. I think Islam is uniquely indigestible for a a secular mindset and people don’t want to admit that,” says bestselling author of Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World, Tom Holland.
He emphasizes the distinctiveness of Christianity compared to Islam, particularly focusing on Christianity’s concept of the secular — a separation between religious and civil life.
Christianity is an institutional structure that provides an ideological framework allowing followers to criticize and judge evil within their culture, a framework Islam lacks. Islam’s unique challenges to secular modernity lie in the non-negotiability of the Quran as the literal and final word of God, complicating possibilities for reformation and secular accommodation. says Holland in a recent interview.
Holland’s core thesis is that Christianity is the cultural background and fundamental worldview—“the soup we swim in” — of Western civilization. This Christianity-infused mindset profoundly differentiates Western Christian civilization from its pre-Christian predecessors, particularly in values, conceptions of humanity, and societal ideals.
His early books were critical of Christianity, but in recent years, Holland has completely altered his views on the value of Jesus Christ’ teachings.
His 2016 article in the New Statesman, shocked the world as he admitted that he was wrong about Christianity and now understood how ground-breaking the Christian faith was for the formation of Western civilization: “In my morals and ethics, I have learned to accept that I am not Greek or Roman at all, but thoroughly and proudly Christian.”
In a recent interview, Holland explores the historically grounded effect of Christianity on Western civilization, and the ongoing challenges Islam poses to secular liberal modernity. He emphasizes the distinctiveness of Christianity compared to Islam, particularly focusing on Christianity’s concept of the secular — the separation between religious and civil life.
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Tom Holland emphasizes Western ignorance of Islam’s origins, principles, and values. For example, Islam totally lacks a secular concept. Unlike Christianity, which developed the idea of separation between church and state, exemplified in Augustine’s writings and the “render unto Caesar” motif, Islam is an all-encompassing system governing every aspect of life.
Western secularism necessitates Muslims to adapt by interpreting Islam as a “religion” in a Western sense, which conflicts with Islam’s classical understanding as a totalizing way of life, including governance and social order.
Islam’s prophetic tradition culminates in the warlord Muhammad as the “seal of the prophets,” delivering the Quran as God’s final message. Historically, Islam was dominant and expansive but faced a modern shock with Western colonial and military power at the end of the 18th century, resulting in Muslim powers confronting the need for recalibration regarding issues such as slavery and governance.
Muslim scholars engaged in reinterpretation, trying to reconcile Islamic law with modern international political realities, especially under Western pressure. This adaptation is likened to a Protestantization of Islam, emphasizing internal, spiritual jihad over literal or violent interpretations.
The rise of Islamic fundamentalism parallels Protestant fundamentalism’s literalist reaction to modernity, resulting in brutal interpretations of scripture sanctioning violence and slavery, though this is a minority, radical stance.
Islam’s unique challenges to secular modernity lie in the non-negotiability of the Quran as the literal and final word of God, complicating possibilities for reformation and secular accommodation.
Holland recognizes the impact Muslim demographics will have on Western secular assumptions and the unsettled tension between liberal secularism and Islamic orthodoxy.
The conversation reiterates that even secular atheists are culturally shaped by the Christian worldview, especially in the West, often failing to appreciate the deep cultural differences with other religious traditions like Islam, which see the world and order differently.
Holland contrasts the Greek divine cruelty with Jesus’ forgiveness amid brutal suffering: “Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do.” This marks a profound and radical ethical transformation in religious worldview and human values.
On Christianity’s historical paradoxes, the discussion explains how Christianity’s core is structured by paradox: a man is also God; the crucified is the triumphant. Early theological debates, such as Marcion’s view of the Old Testament God as different from the New Testament God, led to the establishment of the Christian canon combining the four gospels, Paul’s letters, and the Old Testament as prefiguration.
Paul’s radical assertions in Galatians dissolve social divisions—Jew/Greek, male/female, slave/free—projecting a universal brotherhood in Christ that inspired long-term historical movements such as abolitionism and egalitarian revolutions. However, these ideas also created fractures, especially between early Christians and Jews, with lasting negative consequences such as anti-Judaism.
The conjunction of slavery’s industrialization and Protestant ideas of spiritual empowerment fuelled the transatlantic abolitionist movement, leading to legal action against slavery and slave trading, including attempts to impose international law standards transcending religious dogma. Until this day, Islamic nations have not taken any similar abolitionist approach and in many Islamic countries, slavery is still prevalent. As well as in African nations.
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