GOOD NEWS For Modern Nerds

Copyright (c) 1986 Ernest N. Prabhakar  ernest@alumni.caltech.edu  Freely copyable

Preface

I, Ernest N. Prabhakar,

Called by God to serve Him, and self-appointed apostle to the Nerds;

Realizing that people respond to the gospel most when presented in terms of their own language, and that the language of my chosen people, mathematica, is also one of the most universal languages known to man;

Herein have endeavored to translate the essentials of the gospel into Modern Calculus. For those not fluent in mathematica, I have provided a verbatim translation into English.

Translations

  1. There is one God over all the universe, from everlasting to everlasting. (Deuteronomy 6:4)
  2. He is never-changing, independent of space and time. (Malachi 3:6)
  3. For all men are sinners, and fall short of God. (Romans 3:23)
  4. Christ is the Lamb' de God. (John 1:29)
  5. The Cross of Jesus is victory over death. (Colossians 2:14)
  6. Christ [Fourier] transforms us; the life we live, we no longer live for ourselves, but for Christ. (II Corinthians 5:15)
  7. Love is what differentiates Christians from the world. (John 13:35)
  8. With respect to Christ, there is no differentiation; neither Jew nor Greek, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Scythian, barbarian, slave nor free. (Colossians 3:11)
  9. Sanctification is integrating faith into life over time. (James 2:22)
  10. Radical love. (The Song of Solomon)

History (recorded 6/16/96)

The Nerd Bible started with my sermon notes from1985 at Park Street Church in Boston, where I was an MIT sophomore. Our college pastor Tony DeOrio used phrases like "integrating faith into our lives" and "love should differentiate Christians from the world." Being intrinsically lazy ­ not to mention nerdly ­ I wrote those phrases down using calculus (#7 and #9).

When MIT made available a new-fangled Postscript printer capable of math symbols, I decided to learn the formatting language LaTeX to try it out. Just for the fun of it, I started with my sermon notes, then added other verses which used the different math functions available (#2, #3, #6 and #8). The Fourier transform (#6) is the only formula not recognizable by most first-year calculus students, but it makes such a beautiful mathematical/theological statement I feel it is worth the confusion it causes.

In the fall of 1986, I was studying cultural contextualization in the "Perspectives on the World Christian Movement" missions class. I realized my equations formed something pretty close to a gospel outline in math. To fill in the holes, I came up with several theological and Christological statements (#1, #4,and #5). "Lamb' de God" probably represents the pinnacle of my efforts at combining bad puns and good theology.

The final touch (#10) was based on a challenge my lab partner Scott Beasley issued after seeing my first draft. "Yeah, but could you ever represent the Song of Solomon in calculus?" You be the judge.