Gods & Games: Toward a Theology of Play

by David L. Miller

Book Overview

A deeply thoughtful, deeply irreverent look at the mythology of play

Gods and Games ties together Joseph Campbell's approach to myth and religion with Johan Huizinga's view of our species as Homo ludens -- "Man the Game-player" -- which suggests that play is a central aspect of the human spirit and human culture.

"A comprehensive and clear review.... loaded with quotations both pertinent and entertaining that may be...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1938808541
• ISBN13: 9781938808548
• Release Date: October 2019
• Publisher: Stillpoint/Athena
• Length: 194 Pages
• Weight: 0.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Learn to play like a grown up!

In this marvellous book (it's a scandal that it's not in print) Dr Miller reveals how the idea of games and play has penetrated most academic disciplines to some extent. He goes on to show us that being at play is the only way to be, whether a god in a myth or a mortal practicing ones religion. All of this slowly steers us toward a mighty conclusion whereby Dr Miller reveals the four pillars of a [his] theology of play: non-seriousness is the highest seriousness, fiction is the highest truth, change is the highest stability, and purposeless is the highest purpose. This isn't a self-help book but a book of ideas, one that is tailor-made for anyone who might be taking themselves and their quest for meaning too seriously, as I have. Through it you too may find the courage to reorient your thinking and start playing with those archetypes, myths, images, and symbols that you love so much instead of just reading about them. If you're lucky, through Dr Miller's descriptions of the idea of play you'll learn to break all the rules and thus create something meaningless, which you'll then understand is the only thing that can mean anything.