Does Oedipus Know His Fate

As the play proceeds and Oedipus is passed from hand to hand, he eventually ends up in the home of King Polybus and Queen Merope were he grows into a young man being fed the lie that they were his true parents. When Oedipus is told the prophecy that he will kill his father he flees in an attempt to avoid the murder. However, as fate would have it he ran to a crossroad where he fulfilled the prophecy killing King Laius, his true father. While Oedipus continues to run he meets Jocasta, his birth mother, whom he eventually marries and has children with. If Jocasta had kept Oedipus as a baby and raised him or just killed him herself there would have been no chance of the prophecy coming true.

Jocasta sends Creon away and asks Oedipus what is troubling him. Oedipus confines in her about Tiresias prophecy. Jocasta reassures him by saying prophecies are false telling him of a prophecy that was made long ago. The prophecy told that Laius’s son would kill him and father children with his mother. According to Jocasta, that prophecy is false because Laius was killed by thieves at the place where three roads meet. This catches Oedipus’s attention because he once killed a stranger who wronged him there. He asks for more details and asks Jocasta to bring forth the servant who survived the incident. They both head inside the palace while they wait for the servant.

However, the driving force of Oedipus' fact-finding mission is an attempt to end the plague which racks his city. He does not realize the personal consequences his hunt will have for him, and his "loyalty to the truth" (23) is based on his ignorance of it. In fact, if we examine the events leading up to Oedipus' revelation, the incidental nature of his "quest for identity" becomes apparent. First, he summons Tiresias to name the killer, whom Oedipus does not at the time believe to be himself. Then a messenger arrives from Corinth, unbidden by the king, revealing that Oedipus is not truly Polybus' son. Finally, the shepherd reveals all of Oedipus' past, after having been called for the purpose of providing more information about Laius' death. The coincidental nature of these events is somewhat at odds with Dodds' vision of Oedipus as a sort of Greek private detective who relentlessly ferrets out clues in a self-destructive search for his parents. Oedipus is eager to find the truth, but the most pivotal witnesses for the true story of his birth either come to him of their own volition, or are convened by Oedipus in the hopes that they will tell him something entirely different. In the end, he resigns himself to the truth which would have been clear much earlier (as it was to Jocasta), had he

Many times in life, people think they can determine their own destiny, but, as the Greeks believe, people cannot change fate the gods set. Though people cannot change their fate, they can take responsibility for what fate has brought them. In the story Oedipus, by Sophocles, a young king named Oedipus discovers his dreadful fate. With this fate, he must take responsibility and accept the harsh realities of what’s to come. Oedipus is a very hubris character with good intentions, but because he is too confident, he suffers. In the story, the city of Thebes is in great turmoil due to the death of the previous king, Laius. With the thought of helping his people, Oedipus opens an investigation of King Laius’s murder, and to solve the mystery,

Later a herald from Corinth comes and tells Jocasta Polybus is now dead and the citizens of Corinth want Oedipus to be their king. Oedipus soon finds out his "dad" Polybus is dead and he did not kill him. Although he did not kill his dad, he still fears the prophecy he does not want to marry to his mother Meropi. So then The herald tells Oedipus that Meropi and Polybus are not his real parents. The herald explains that Oedipus was given to him when he was an infant the shepherd was supposed to leave him on mountain of Kitheron but instead gave him to Polybus.

Also, this made Oedipus lonely and feel more guilty and grief of his actions. The second messenger says “the greatest griefs are those we cause ourselves”(exodos 67). Jocasta should’ve not married her son if she did not want to face all those trouble in her life. I believe she made the wrong choice to marry Oedipus. However, Oedipus is now left alone with the death of his mother. First was the mystery of the death of Laius and know Jocasta have committed suicide, to end all sorrow and problems in her life. The death of Jocasta is what made Oedipus very anxious, realize his flaws and find the truth about his life. Oedipus blames Apollo for his monstrous fate and destiny. “Dear Children, the god was Apollo. He brought my sick, sick fate upon me” (Sophocles 72). Oedipus cries out loud and says “How could I bear to see when all my sight was horror everywhere? (72 line 12-13). Oedipus now wishes to die “If only I had died, this weight of monstrous doom” (73 line 4-5). This was the end of Oedipus’s life as he is left with no love, friends, hope, and bliss. He had ruined the life of many people. At the end you can see more of the grief Oedipus faces as

Oedipus the King is a tragedy that displays irony throughout the play. In the play, King Laius and his wife Jocasta learn that in the prophecy their newborn son, Oedipus, will kill his father and marry his mother. In order to prevent the prophecy from occurring, they decide to bind and tie his ankles and then abandoned him. When Oedipus grew up, he eventually learned about this prophecy and decided to leave his parents. What he did not realize was that the parents who raised him were not his biological parents. On his voyage to Thebes, Oedipus ended up in a chariot accident

Jocasta rejoices, convinced that Polybus’s death from natural causes has disproved the prophecy that Oedipus would murder his father. At Jocasta’s summons, Oedipus comes outside, hears the news, and rejoices with her. He now feels much more inclined to agree with the queen in deeming prophecies worthless and viewing chance as the principle governing the world. But while Oedipus finds great comfort in the fact that one-half of the prophecy has been disproved, he still fears the other half—the half that claimed he would sleep with his mother.

Oedipus Rex is a Greek tragedy written by Sophocles around 400 BC. The play is about the king of Thebes, Oedipus and his discovery on how fate is inevitable. In the play, Thebes is under a curse because their last king was murdered and no one knows who the murderer is. Oedipus takes it upon himself to discover who had killed the king and in doing so he discovers that the murderer is indeed himself. He learns this through a prophecy he had heard that stated: he would kill his father and marry his mother. Which occurs when he kills a traveler on the road and marries the queen of Thebes, who is his biological mother. In the play, Oedipus is a man full of hubris as the reader observes him denying the truth, time and time again until the evidence is undeniable. The other characters in

Early on in the story, Oedipus is the proud and confident king of Thebes; he is a man that is not to be underestimated or degraded. This once undisputed fact becomes more debatable the longer the play continues, however. The conflict begins with Oedipus attempting to lift a curse that has been unleashed on the kingdom of Thebes. This curse was caused by the murder of the previous king, Laius, and the only way for it to be lifted is for the murderer to be exiled from Thebes. Oedipus works fervently to unravel the mystery behind who Laius’ killer was. However, each new discovery ends up incriminating Oedipus as the killer instead. Along the way Oedipus discovers that his supposed parents, the king and queen of Corinth, are not his true parents. This revelation pushes him to begin a new search for his biological parents, a search that eventually leads him to one of Lainus’ shepherds. It is this shepherd that reveals to King Oedipus that his mother is Jocasta, his current wife. Consequently, Oedipus falls into a fit of despair in which he stabs his own eyes out and confronts the consequences of his shameful existence. By the end of the play, Oedipus has not only lost his status as the king of Thebes, but has also been exiled from the kingdom and has become an outcast for all of society to hate. The transition Oedipus undergoes

Oedipus solved the Sphinx’s riddle and married Jocasta far after he was a child, therefore, it shows that the Oedipus Complex does not apply to him. In addition to marrying Jocasta when he was an adult, Oedipus killed Laius, but not because he felt a sense of rivalry between him and Jocasta. As Oedipus traveled to Thebes, he encountered a crossroad. A man in a carriage wanted to thrust him out of the road. This made Oedipus extremely angry, and he announced, “And then I killed them all,” (Sophocles 946-947). Laius was among those who Oedipus killed at the crossroads due to his temper. Oedipus did not feel that he had to win Jocasta’s love, because Oedipus did not know that he was Jocasta’s husband, proving that the Oedipus Complex does not apply to him again. Furthermore, Oedipus did not know who his true parents were. Oedipus was raised thinking that Polybus and Merope were his birth parents. After Laius and Jocasta heard the prophecy about their son, that he was to kill his own father and lie with his mother, they made a decision. Jocasta explains what they did to Oedipus by saying, “-before three days were out after his birth King Laius pierced his ankles and by the hands of others cast him forth upon a pathless hillside,” (Sophocles 825-828). Laius and Jocasta tried to kill Oedipus three days after they had him, so Oedipus would have no memory of them. This

To begin, Oedipus does not know the true identity of his parents. As the play starts, Oedipus believes that his true birthplace is in Corinth to Polybus and Merope while in reality, he was born in Thebes to Laius and Jocasta. If Oedipus had known the truth of his parents, he would have returned to Thebes and could have tried to avoid the prophecy that he would kill his father and marry his mother. Oedipus’ ignorance of his past, he attempted to flee Corinth, leading ultimately to his father's death. Throughout the story, Oedipus tries to find out who took the death of Laius.

Often the past will present answers to questions about the future as well as questions of the now, and in Oedipus Rex, Oedipus’ past plays an integral role in his pursuit of righting the wrongs that are affecting him in the present. In the play, Oedipus must identify who has killed Laius in order to exile them to solve the qualms of his people, and in a dialogue with Jocasta, who happens to be his wife as well as his mother, she reveals to him details of the death of Laius that seem far too familiar for his comfort (Sophocles 27). This revelation of information acts as a catalyst that forces Oedipus to make the connection between his past and what Jocasta is telling him. This realization that he may have been responsible for Laius’ death exposes him to the weight of the pursuit of justice sometimes hold for humans. Through this dialogue, Oedipus comes to fear that he is the culprit of the scandal that is plaguing the situation, thus putting him in the position of a criminal who will face the due punishment for the crime. This internal conflict that Oedipus experiences creates and

Oedipus rises as a hero, but eventually loses his power when he faithfully commits to terrible deeds. Jocasta, the wife and mother to Oedipus, doubts that the oracle of Apollo is genuine. Since she and her previous husband, King Laius, left Oedipus to die in the mountains, they refuse to believe the oracle. She claims that “ ..It was fate that he should die a victim at the hands of his own son, a son to be born of Laius and me. But, see now, he, the king, was killed by foreign highway robbers at a place where three roads meet” (Sophocles, 493: 791-796). Despite Jocasta and Laius’s intentions to change their fate, the prophecy remains unfeigned. The fact that Oedipus is alive even after being abandoned, is evidence that their fates are

Oedipus questions Jocasta about Laius "how did he look? Describe him" (817) until Jocasta can not answer any more questions. The messenger then arrives to tell Oedipus that his father, Polybus, has died. Ironically, while relieving Oedipus's fear of killing his own father, the messenger causes even greater fears by telling Oedipus that Polybus is not his biological father. Oedipus then discovers that he was brought to Polybus when he was an infant and the shepherd found Oedipus on Mount Cithaeron. The shepherd unwillingly admits that he knew that Oedipus is the son of Jocasta and Laius. Finally, Oedipus discovers all the facts about his true identity and that he killed his own father and married his mother.