Nem acaso, nem necessidade: o jogo como metáfora da criação

The hypothesis of this study is that the category of the "game" should be considered as an epistemological and hermeneutic element for thinking theologically about creation. From this hypothesis are certainly derived implications for an understanding of the cosmos and of all creatures, particularly the human creature – this is what I wish to show – but also implications for how God is represented. From a theological perspective, thinking of creation as a game leads to the appearance, in all its singularity, of the universe of the freedom of Creation, of the creatures of the Creator, irrespective of any kind of end, cause or will; the universe of gratuity, of gift, of grace, irrespective of necessity and of constraint. Thinking of creation as a game places us at the heart of a dynamism of transcendence which crosses us, builds us and means to us an Otherness which, in its Absolute Somewhere, paradoxically constitutes us. What is missing, then, is an understanding of what the game tells us of truth about the human creature and also an understanding of the power of this existential being to say something of God and of what is at work in the game of creation. This is the aim of the present study.