The Enchanted Cosmos

In The Enchanted Cosmos, Ravi Scott Jain explores how the study of mathematics should be formative and participatory. Students should grow as much in wonder and judgment as they do in skill and should experience reality through mathematics, not simply work problems. Without discounting mathematical progress, Jain demonstrates how ancient and medieval perspectives can enrich pedagogy and curriculum. Through a variety of puzzles, proofs, and other resources, The Enchanted Cosmos details practical approaches to multiple levels of mathematics, from higher arithmetic through calculus. Moreover, this curriculum of wonder culminates in wisdom and worship, helping students discover the cosmos as enchanted, woven together with a harmony, or a musical logos, that is amenable to numerical description. It entertains Clement of Alexandria’s claim that Christ himself, the Logos who is love, is greater than the music of the spheres because he is the epitome of humanity holding all things together and through himself reconciling them to God.