“If Jesus were being homeschooled, God would have taught him about Evolution.” –Nana (aka “Smrt Mama’s momma”)
While I strongly, strongly, strongly disagree with creationists (especially “young earth” creationists), I understand why people who believe in that would feel the need to rewrite all the science books to fit into their beliefs. After all, one really must come up with explanations to justify all the nonsense and debunk all the actual scientific evidence in order to not feel like they are in some way ignorant or gullible. I see where religious text can fit into a literature, writing, or grammar program. One needs example sentences, after all, so why not insinuate Bible passages at every possible opportunity. I can even see why it’s necessary to rewrite (or at least heavily edit) history from a fundamentalist Christian perspective in order to justify the unjustifiable and try to give back-applied context to historical events.
Math, however? Surely math is a subject that can remain secular. Surely math doesn’t need a religious context to be taught in a religious curriculum. Math is what it is and doesn’t require a lot of dressing up, right? I do not understand why even the most fundamentalist of Christians would feel the need to Jesus-ify mathematics, and yet, I assure you that they do. “Young Earth” creationists and Bible literalists just couldn’t stop with science, history, and literature. The “Christian approach to mathematics” or “Biblical math” has resulted in numerous math curricula. In fact, some claim that only through studies of the Bible can one “genuinely understand and affirm the real agreement about mathematical truths.” Math is a “testimony to God’s faithfulness” and you can order all manner of materials to help you learn more.
And lo, how Jesus does crop up in homeschool math curricula. Of course, all the Christian curricula publishers have their own math program, but some of the programs make math all about the Bible. Christ Centered Math will provide “a strong Scriptural foundation for arithmetic” for your Kindergartner, just in case they weren’t getting enough Christ in their Christ Centered Phonics. Bob Jones University Press promise that its math curriculum will provide “nothing to conflict with the Truth and everything to support it.” BJU Press is subtly letting us know that math will NOT stand in the way of Jesus. A Beka Book isn’t hung up on subtlety. “No subject matter better reflects the glory of God than mathematics. To study mathematics is to study God’s thoughts after Him, for He is the great Engineer and Architect of the universe,” says A Beka Book, who also promises to eschew “modern theorists” and their “modern theories” (like the dangerous set theory). Christian Perspective doesn’t exactly sell a curriculum, but will sell you a CD on how to teach math Biblically to your homeschooled children (along with several CDs on socialization) so they can “discover God in your math class.”
I don’t know about you, but I don’t really need God in my math class. I need math in my math class. All the Bible verses and that Biblical “perspective” are just getting in the way of actually imparting mathematical skills to children. Pretty soon, they’ll need a Christian Calculator to make sense of everything.
Why can’t it be enough to have God (and/or Jesus) in your heart? Why do you need God in your Calculus, too?
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[...] quote from Errett Bishiop (1967), which also addresses last week’s post about Christian mathematics curricula : “Mathematics belongs to man, not to God [...] If God [...]
How can math be anything but math? It is a concrete science. I mean, you could use the Bible to do word problems, but then you’d have to really know how long a cubit is, and well, who has time for that! I had no idea.
I guess when you make science up as you go along, you can make math up, too.
How can you figure out the size of Heaven if you don’t know the length of cubit? Sheesh, you heathens!
Ever since I was hushed by the woman at the Roswell library teaching out of “Grammar for Catholics”, I am stunned by the need for holy rolling curricula.
I do wonder why some people feel that they need this one element of their lives (religion) to permeate EVERYTHING they see, do, touch, and feel. It reeks of insecurity to me.
Abeka books rents out space at the EHC every month for a sale. VERY popular – you’ll see the whole families show out for it. We just like it ’cause that gets them in the Center and then we can sell ourselves. I had no idea what it was until someone mentioned it was homeschool books. Then I had one homeschool mom set me straight on exactly what kind of homeschool books they are – and why she won’t buy them, even though she’s Christian. Shocking that people think they need to beat that stuff into their kids. Sometimes I guess people feel they need a brain washing to survive in life.
Good grief! Have you seen the value of pi the have in the old testament?
Those people must have had some wobbly circles!
In geometry you get to prove how 3 is really 1. Now that’s math.
Oh, you can easily prove that any number =1, using a false proof. The fun is finding the mistake in it (0*n = 0*1, so n=1?). It’s a good emphasis for WHY you can’t divide by 0.
About religion in math: there’s some interesting history about both motivation through religion and religion getting the way of progress. Kepler saw “God in geometry”, which I think is a lovely thought. It both motivated him, and slowed him down (when he obsessed over the perfect shapes).
Pythagoras tried to keep people from knowing about irrational numbers (square root of 2), because of (supposedly) religion. There might be other reasons, but this is a common one I’ve heard.
I really like learning math history in addition to math itself.
I found a great video on youtube (yay free!), a BBC Documentary on mathematics. It starts here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WD1CXzTbUtA
Another good series is Carl Sagan’s “Cosmos”. You can find it on Google Video for free as well