Abstract

Alfred North Whtiehead stated that mathematics and music compete with each other for the honor of being the most novel achievement of the human imagination. Actually, there is no rivalry or competition, for the two enterprises interpenetrate once the investigation is pursued far enough. Though on opposite ends of the science-humanities spectrum, each discipline points toward the other and elicits the same sort of reverential puzzlement. This essay considers the seminal interconnection between music and mathematics and concludes that this unexpected conjunction of opposites bespeaks a higher, unseen reality. Music cum mathematics is an optics that allows us to discover, celebrate, and participate in God's ongoing Creation.