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In Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift, there is little discussion of religion except for a passage from part 3, which reads,

To this I added another petition, “that for the sake of my patron the king of Luggnagg, his majesty would condescend to excuse my performing the ceremony imposed on my countrymen, of trampling upon the crucifix: because I had been thrown into his kingdom by my misfortunes, without any intention of trading.” When this latter petition was interpreted to the Emperor, he seemed a little surprised; and said, “he believed I was the first of my countrymen who ever made any scruple in this point; and that he began to doubt, whether I was a real Hollander, or not; but rather suspected I must be a Christian.

We never find out if Gulliver is in fact, Christian, but this is the only mention I could find in the book. Do we know whether he was Christian? Does Swift ever mention it in any of his letters?

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2 Answers 2

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He was definitely a Christian, and devout enough not to want to desecrate the cross.

In part III, he says:

I spoken Dutch tolerably well; I told him who we were, and begged him, in consideration of our being Christians and Protestants, of neighbouring countries in strict alliance, that he would move the captains to take some pity on us.

And then later in chapter XI, he begs the Japanese emperor not to force him to trample on the cross:

To this I added another petition, ‘that for the sake of my patron the king of Luggnagg, his majesty would condescend to excuse my performing the ceremony imposed on my countrymen, of trampling upon the crucifix: because I had been thrown into his kingdom by my misfortunes, without any intention of trading.’

The only occurrence of "church" in the book is in the preface, "From the Publisher to the Reader". This is also fictional but not really part of the events of the book.

I have observed in the churchyard at Banbury in that county, several tombs and monuments of the Gullivers.

This doesn't really say anything about religion, but it's included for the sake of completeness.

Likewise, all the occurrences of "god" or "gods" aren't related to Gulliver's beliefs, but the beliefs of the inhabitants of the land that he is in.

TL;DR: he's religious enough that he calls himself a Christian and doesn't to want to trample on the cross, but no other mention of him going to church or anything like that.

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Actually, earlier in Part III, I found this qupte:

I told him who we were, and begged him, in consideration of our being Christians and Protestants, of neighbouring countries in strict alliance, that he would move the captains to take some pity on us.

So the short answer is yes, he is in fact Christian. I have no idea, though, how religious he is exactly--but since you didn't ask that, I will not answer.

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    "I have no idea, though, how religious he is exactly--but since you didn't ask that, I will not answer." that information is very relevant to this question.
    – user111
    Commented Jan 23, 2017 at 14:22
  • @Hamlet the question as stated by the asker is "Do we know whether he was Christian?" I answered that question. What more do you wnt?
    – CHEESE
    Commented Jan 23, 2017 at 14:42
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    That glosses over the question being asked. Asking if "someone is religious...?" implies a certain level of devotion and engagement in practice — not simply "Is he Christian?" Commented Jan 23, 2017 at 14:43
  • @RobertCartaino Describing oneself as Christian usually implies some religiousness; when I say I don't know how religious Gulliver is, I mean that I couldn't find any representation of this.
    – CHEESE
    Commented Jan 23, 2017 at 15:39

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