Is Oedipus Innocent Essay

In my opinion, Oedipus does not deserve what he got and is a victim of fate. This is because all his actions were unintentional. However, some of his actions were ignorant. Right from the beginning we see how Oedipus was envisioned to kill his father and marry his mother, thus his feet being pinned together and him

Oedipus, on the other hand, is not so content with the events unfolding in his life. He is persistent in finding the truth surrounding King Laius’s death. “To protest Apollo is necessarily dialectical, since the pride and agility of the intellect of Oedipus, remorselessly searching out the truth, in some sense is also against the nature of truth. In this vision of reality, you shall know the truth, and the truth will make you mad” (Bloom 10). His investigation leads him to discover the truth surrounding the prophecy in which he kills his father and sleeps with his mother. During this whole play, Oedipus is never really content with anything.

This information makes Oedipus uneasy. He recalls having killed a man answering Laius' description at this very spot when he was fleeing from his home in Corinth to avoid fulfillment of a similar prophecy. An aged messenger arrives from Corinth, at this point, to announce the death of King Polybus, supposed father of Oedipus, and the election of Oedipus as king in his stead. On account of the old prophecy Oedipus refuses to return to Corinth until his mother, too, is dead. To calm his fears the messenger assures him that he is not the blood son of Polybus and Merope, but a foundling from the house of Laius deserted in the mountains. This statement is confirmed by the old shepherd whom Jocasta had charged with the task of exposing her babe. Thus the ancient prophecy has been fulfilled in each

Oedipus perceives such acts as offerings for him which causes him to think he is greater than those who surround him. The townspeople pray and worship Oedipus, allowing him to consider himself their "world-renowned king" (Sophocles 10). With the belief of having such high power, Oedipus believes he can determine his own fate. This causes him to be blind of his past and oblivious to the facts. With the mindset of being higher than everyone, Oedipus' arrogance blinds him intellectually from figuring out who his real parents are. Instead of analyzing his childhood in attempt to figure out the truth, he does not question the past and sprites those who challenge him. Oedipus is aware that when he was three days old his "ankles [were] pierced and pinned/ together, gave it to be cast away/ by others on the trackless mountain side" (Sophocles 726-28). He is also aware that the oracle of Thebes declared that one day he would "slay his father and wed his mother" (Sophocles 1). However, his hubris personality prevents him from realizing that he, in fact, is Laius's son. Instead, Oedipus refer to himself as "Fortunes favorite

At the end of the play Oedipus Tyrannus, the Chorus makes this observation about their King Oedipus’s life and ultimate demise. Throughout the course of the play, Oedipus learns of a prophecy or curse placed upon him that he will one day kill his father and sleep with his mother. Fearful of the curse coming true, Oedipus escapes from the city he was raised in to keep his parent’s safe, completely unaware that they were not his birth parents. Thinking he was safe from harm of the prophecy,

In the beginning of the story, Oedipus is very taken back by the situation. He will not accept the truth of his fate and accuses Tiresias of lying to him so Oedipus’s bother- in- law, Creon, could take the throne. Oedipus is extremely dumbfounded by this news because he had no knowledge of killing his father or marrying his mother, but what he learns later is that who he thought were his parents were not his real parents. When he finally realizes that he did in fact marry his own mother and kill his father, he accepts it and punishes himself in order to uphold his promise to his people. By this point there is no way Oedipus can escape his fate. Tiresias says to Oedipus, “No man in the world can make the gods do more than the gods will” (811). Since he did kill his father, the previous king, Oedipus has to be shunned by all of Thebes. Because there is no way of changing his fate, he accepts his responsibilities by giving himself the punishment he assigned to the murderer of Laius.

In the book Oedipus the King by Sophocles, there are many controversies on whether Oedipus is guilty of his actions or innocent. Oedipus is a guilty man and his action proved so in the play. Oedipus should be held liable for his crimes of patricide (killing his father) and marrying and having a sexual relationship his mother. Oedipus knew nothing about the past of Thebes however, what was done cannot be taken back. His actions were wrong because incest is unethical, and murdering someone is a crime. He guilty because guilt lies in the act of doing, not in intention. In addition to the prophecy, Oedipus is also guilty of hubris because he displayed excessive pride. The choice was his, and this accounts for some of his guilt. Oedipus is

     From before Oedipus was born, he was doomed to kill his father and marry his mother, a very cursed fate. Throughout his life, the readers learn that Oedipus tries his hardest to avoid this dreadful proclamation; however, the gods were against him before he was even in his mother's womb, so Oedipus and the readers quickly learn that there would be no way for him to avoid

In Oedipus Rex, the first messenger came for Corinth to tell Oedipus that King Polybus died and, at that time Oedipus thought that Polybus was his father. With that Oedipus thought that is fate isn’t true because

murder. He tells Creon "you will find me a firm ally, and together we shall exact vengeance for our land and for the god?And with the help of God, we shall find success ? or ruin" (5) He knew what his duty was and that was what he wanted to follow. He needed to save thousands of people and Oedipus would go to any means to save them. This is an innocent person and a trustworthy King. "My words are uttered as a stranger to the act, a stranger to its tale"(7). He tells us that he cannot solve the "riddle the very skill that proved him great" (11). He cannot do it alone. Why is this? If he is so guilty of this crime and he is the "murderer that he seeks" then why does he go on with the search? (10). The reason is that he does not know that he has caused the grief for his people. He does not know that he is the murderer. "Ask what you wish. I am not the murderer.", is what he uttered to Creon because he believed that he was not the murderer (14). The fault behind Oedipus? fate lies partly on Apollo and on the prophecy that he was told. Had he been blind to that prophecy he would have remained in Corinth and ruled as a true ruler. He would not have wed his mother nor murdered his father. But why do these things happen to Oedipus? Why when he tries to be the best does he get the worst? His fate led him there. He was doomed to follow the prophecy at

Oedipus is a man of noble blood; his parents, who raised him as a child, were King Polybus and Queen Merope of Corinth. Oedipus also becomes a king himself when he solves the Sphinx’s riddle, thus saving Thebes and taking over the throne of the late King Laius. Oedipus then marries Jocasta, Laius’s widow,

The messenger remarks that Oedipus need not worry, because Polybus and his wife, Merope, are not Oedipus’s biological parents. The messenger, a shepherd by profession, knows firsthand that Oedipus came to Corinth as an orphan. One day long ago, he was tending his sheep when another shepherd approached him carrying a baby, its ankles pinned together. The messenger took the baby to the royal family of Corinth, and they raised him as their own. That baby was Oedipus. Oedipus asks who the other shepherd was, and the messenger answers that he was a servant of Laius.

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

Oedipus was informed by an oracle that he would be the one to murder his father and marry his mother. It is important to know that Oedipus is a descendant of the first King of Thebes and because of this several of his relatives have met tragic deaths by taking unwarranted actions into their own hands. Before Oedipus was born his father Laius was told by the same oracle not to have any children by his wife Jocasta which he did anyway. This was not a situation that originated with Oedipus; it seems that this type of fate is destined to be intertwined in this family’s bloodline.

Oedipus did not have a fair start in life. His father, Laius, heard prophecy that Oedipus would one day kill his father and sleep with his mother. In order to prevent this, Laius gave Oedipus to a shepherd to be killed. Fortunately, through a string of events, Oedipus's life was saved, and he even went on to become the honored king of Thebes. Despite this feat, Oedipus still managed to make several decisions that ultimately fulfilled the original prophecy told to Laius, and inevitably sealed Oedipus?s fate.