A bull has the ability to charge at you at up to 35mph. There are 1040 possible moves in chess. If a cue ball hits half of the intended ball in snooker – and not the centre – the probability is very high that the cue ball will travel in a direction that is 30 degrees from the aiming line and in the opposite direction of the ball that was hit. Such calculations lie behind activities that humans over millennia have considered as “play”. Yet when we are involved in playing, we rarely have the time to make these types of estimations – we are immersed in an activity. It seems that these types of activities are inextricable from the human condition.
Late last year, Netflix released an original series narrated by Idris Elba on this topic. Human Playground successfully shows how the search for risk, thrill and excitement is a human universal. Play, in its various forms, takes up a huge proportion of a human’s life. We play as children, we gamble as adults, and at all times we take risks. All of these aspects of play pertain to what it means to be human. Animals play as well, but, lacking the rational component of humans, their play remains on an instinctual level.
Starting with a woman braving the Sahara desert in a race made many times more challenging than a marathon by severe weather and terrain, the series presents humans pushing through pain in search of – what? Fame? The proverbial “gain”? There might be many motivating factors, maybe as many as there are contestants. But at the root there is a human desire to prove oneself to oneself – to show that one is capable of what one thought oneself incapable. Here, the play is against the self. It challenges assumptions we have about ourselves, erecting a yardstick by which we can measure our courage, stamina, strength and energy.
Through snippets showing men facing charging bulls in a crowd-filled arena, Senegalese wrestlers providing a multimillion-dollar entertainment business, and rites of passage undertaken in challenging forms such as martial arts, Human Playground showcases the deep-seated desire humans have to take risks and to find a place of belonging. Sports provide these fundamental needs with an outlet, confined and codified by accompanying rules, rituals and potential awards. The motivation for sport, which can be seen as a formalised setting for taking risks, is play.
The idea of play as an essential feature of life is perhaps more often lived than reflected upon. Yet, in the 1970s Bishop Klaus Hemmerle sent a short booklet to his friend Hans Uhrs von Balthasar for the latter’s birthday. What resulted was one of the most exciting developments in what we might call philosophical theology, and a text that suggests that play is vital for understanding human beings. With his Theses Towards a Trinitarian Ontology, Hemmerle unwittingly inaugurated a movement that is flourishing at the moment under the name of Trinitarian Ontology. Ontology refers to the being of things, or why things are as they are. Perhaps, at its most fundamental level, it asks why things are at all. Trinitarian, here, adds the notion of a Divine Trinity, revealed to us by theology. So, instead of asking merely about things as they are, Trinitarian ontology asks us how the knowledge of the trinity helps us to understand our own predicament, in light of the revealed truth of a God who is also a community of persons.
Hemmerle’s thesis ask what such an ontology could contribute to human thought, moving away from (post)modern ideas of suspending the questions raised by theology, as well as stepping beyond Neo-Scholastic manuals and limiting methods. One theses, number 22, speaks of play as a concept with great potential for unpacking human life.
Human beings are indeed individuals. You are not I and vice versa. But humans are not merely individuals. We are subjects, standing in relation to each other, and it is only in relation to each other that our individuality can emerge as individuality. Hemmerle draws on this realisation, showing how this works in the realm of play too. He writes, “I experience myself anew in playing, and what is played is made new in playing it – this, for example, is the tension in all artistic interpretation. I am only playing Mozart well if Mozart is still Mozart. But when I play really well, Mozart becomes more Mozart-like, and I become more myself.”
There is more at play when we immerse in playful activities to seek something beyond entertainment and mere thrills. We partake in something essential to human life, using mind and body to overcome our own limitations, while also discovering the limits of our potential. We stand at a threshold of self-knowledge, confronted with our selves in a striking manner. The more we engage in play, the more we excel, and so the more we come to know about ourselves. Play isn’t an optional extra in life, and when we come to realise the fundamental role playfulness plays in our existence – whether it be in taking risks or pursuing cultural activities such as music and painting – we will be a step closer to a fulfilled life.
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