  Inspired by the AdS/CFT correspondence, we develop an explicit formal duality
between the planar limit of a d-dimensional gauge theory and a classical field
theory in a (d+1)-dimensional anti-de Sitter space. The key ingredient is the
identification of fields in AdS with generalized Hubbard-Stratonovich
transforms of single-trace couplings of the QFT. We show that the Wilsonian
renormalization group flow of these transformed couplings matches the
holographic (Hamilton-Jacobi) flow of bulk fields along the radial direction in
AdS. This result allows one to outline an AdS/CFT dictionary that does not rely
on string theory.
