“Does God play dice?” From Albert Einstein to Stephen Hawking, great scientists have related metaphorically games of chance to the divine, to speak about the utmost mysteries of the universe. But they were not the first to do so.
Already in ancient India, one of the principal gods of Hinduism, Shiva, was very often presented in texts and visual arts as playing dice. In one of Hinduism’s most celebrated myths, Shiva plays dice with his wife Parvati, in a game that symbolizes the whole world. Later, other natural religions also included dicing in their mythology.
The ancient Greek philosopher Plato went a step further. Board games, he wrote, were invented by no other than the Egyptian god Thoth, who was also the inventor of writing, numeracy, and astronomy.
Independently of whether gods played dice or any other game, it is historically proven that games and metaphysics are related in various ways.