The politico-religious wave

An electromagnetic (em) wave travels through space at an astounding 299,792,458 m/s. This number, colloquially known as the speed of light (a form of em radiation), is the speed limit for anything that moves in the universe. While such a wave moves through space, it barely loses its energy. Light from an exploding star billions of lightyears away reaches Earth, and retains the signature that dignifies it as light from a dying star—even after travelling through space for billions of years. How does it do that? The answer illustrates the ideal symbiotic relationship: an electric field that generates a magnetic field, and a magnetic field that generates an electric field, each perpendicular to the other, each feeding into the other, carrying themselves through space and time.



This description of the propagation of an electromagnetic wave parallels, with striking similarity, the relationship between politics and religion. Each entity thrives on polarization, on creating and consuming potentials, on penetrating all regions of space unless shielded by some leaden obstacle. Even though each is a necessary manifestation of humanism, one is dissociated from all mortality—exhibiting a dangerous tendency to be omnipresent—and the other is associated closely with the very act of being—wielding an omnipotent weapon. Of course, in the course of their independent existence, they are strong, weak, focused, diffuse, directional, pregnant, and many other things. Together, however, they are a lethal combination—for governance as well as discovery.