Is Life Just a Game?
Is Life Just A Game?
A popular view about life is that it is “just a game”. We have one life and we should make the most of it. However, is life just for mere play? This belief ignores or denies the Divine, and any form of Divine accountability. Even if some people “believe” in a religion or God, many still ignore the implications of holding such views. This is the crisis of a secularised mind, you can believe in God and religious values, but will practically ignore the implications of these beliefs in your life. This type of person has a de-compartmentalised mind, on occasion they hold on to some religious or spiritual ideas (usually at a funeral, when they lose their job or when their partners decided to move on), but most of their lives is premised on: you only live once, so make the most of it.
Ignoring or denying God and any Divine accountability leads to an existential nightmare. Rationally speaking, holding on to such views, leads to absurd conclusions (known as argumentum ad ignoratium). When you play a game, you either win or lose, and then you eventually die; game over. This irrational and unintuitive view on life is not simply a worldview that exists in a bubble. If its claims are true, then one would have to make some inevitable existential conclusions that are very bleak. Under this view, life is ludicrous. The formula is simple: denying or ignoring God, Divinely given purpose and accountability equals no ultimate hope and no true happiness (as well as many other things, but I have a word limit). This conclusion is not an outdated religious cliché; it is a result of thinking logically about the implications of this world view.
Having a purpose for our lives implies that there is a reason for our existence, in other words some kind of intention and objective. Without a purpose we have no reason to exist, and we do not really have a deep, profound meaning for our lives. Believing that life is just a game cannot provide profound answers for our existence, and therefore real happiness can never be achieved. When we stop treating life like a game and become God-conscious, we free ourselves and find ourselves. Only then can we achieve true happiness both in this life and the next
As the Qur’an eloquently explains,“There truly are signs in the creation of the heavens and earth, and in the alternation of night and day, for those with understanding, who remember God standing, sitting, and lying down, who reflect on the creation of the heavens and earth: “Our Lord! You have not created all this without purpose …”. Chapter 3 Verses 190 – 191.
Purpose gives us that deeper meaning. So we may now ask, what is our purpose?
The most important question in life is ‘Why are we here?’
Since our ultimate purpose is to worship God, we must establish our natural balance and to find out who we really are. When we worship God, we free ourselves, and find ourselves. If we do not, we are forgetting what makes us human.
In conclusion, believing that life is just a game cannot provide an intellectual foundation for our sense of ultimate hope. This view cannot give us profound answers for our existence, and therefore real happiness can never be achieved. If someone argues that they are happy under this view, I would argue it is a drunken type of happiness. They only sober up when they start thinking deeply about their own existence.
And I did not create the jinn and humankind except to worship Me… [Qur’anChapterChapter 51 Verses 56-58]
“And We did not create the heaven and the earth and whatever is between them as a game. If We wished to take a pastime, We would have taken it by Ourselves, if We were to do that at all”
(Qur’an Chapter 21 Verses 16-17)