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Fate And Freewill In Oedipus The King

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The Greeks believed that they were controlled by fate, or destiny, and that they could not escape it. Oedipus’ fate was that he would murder his father and marry his mother. He moved away from his, not known to him, adoptive father in order to protect him and wound up murdering his birth father, King Laios of Thebes. After Laios’ death, Oedipus married the widowed queen Jocasta, not knowing that she is his birth mother. Some believe, because he was ignorant of his crimes, that he is innocent. This is simply not the case. Just because a person does not know they committed a crime, does not mean said person is innocent. For example, if today a person in a drunken state killed another person and woke up the next morning not remembering anything, does that excuse them from their crime? This is similar to the predicament that Oedipus finds himself in. Not only did he kill his father, but the entire company with Laios except for one sole survivor. Even though he does not remember killing multiple men, and he could not get away from his …show more content…

Jocasta is King Laios’ now widowed wife and queen. It was considered normal for Oedipus, the hero of Thebes, to marry the queen of Thebes after her husband’s death. However, it was unknown that Jocasta was in fact Oedipus’ birth mother. When the information was found out, Jocasta hung herself. She “wail[ed] for the double fruit of her marriage, [a] husband by her husband, children by her child” (Sophocles 68). Oedipus yelled “Ah God! It was true! All the prophecies!...Oedipus, damned in his birth, in his marriage damned, [d]amned in the blood he shed with his own hand” (Sophocles 64). He then proceeded to blind himself because he could not find joy in the world around him. Based upon his and Jocasta’s reactions, he seems to feel extremely guilty and unhappy about marrying his mother, even if it was his

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Since Oedipus was not aware of who his biological parents were, he was not truly guilty of killing his father and sleeping with his mother. The Greeks strongly believed in a person’s fate. They believed that no matter what a person does, there is no escaping his or her fate. Although Oedipus technically committed the crimes of killing his father and sleeping with his mother, he is not guilty of these because he unknowingly did these

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944 Words | 4 Pages

Oedipus was cursed when he was a baby and found out his destiny when the god Apollo showed him a vision saying “You are fated to couple with your mother, you will bring a breed of children into the light no man can bear to see- you will kill your father, the one who gave you life!” (Sophocles 873-875) However, Oedipus did not know that the ones who found him and raised him as his son were not his parents. After the prophecy, Oedipus decided to run away to try to change his fate even though it was already set to kill his father and sleep with his mother, unfortunately he couldn’t do anything about it. “Its mine alone, my destiny-I am Oedipus!”

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776 Words | 4 Pages

Oedipus fails to overcome the fate that has been set out for him by the gods. Though the case was different for him, as unlike Hamlet, Oedipus really couldn’t have done anything to avoid his fate of killing his father and marrying his mother. He believed that his real parents were in Corinth and the best way to avoid his fate was to flee the city. Unfortunately for Oedipus, what he had not known was that he was adopted, and his real parents lived in Thebes, the city he fled to. It was nearly impossible for him to have avoided his fate.

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1377 Words | 6 Pages

Background Information: In Oedipus the King, by Sophocles, Oedipus was told that he would kill his father Laius and marry his mother Jocasta. However, Oedipus doesn’t believe that he killed Laius but was blind to the truth for him accept it which led to his demise. 3.Thesis Statement:

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727 Words | 3 Pages

On his journey to get away from whom he thought were his parents, Oedipus kills a group of men. Oedipus is blind to the fact that one of the men was King Laius, who he will later learn was his father. Although the very poor and cruel decisions that Oedipus and Jocasta make ultimately lead them to their fate, they were blind to the extent of most of their decisions.

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732 Words | 3 Pages

His destiny was predetermined by the gods who created him. He was born a child with many flaws and would be a child who would cause many wrongdoings. According to Apollo, he should be destroyed immediately and be thrown away in the mountains to be left to die. But, because of the kindness and pity from the Shepherd, Oedipus’ life is saved. This horrible prophecy made him an unwanted child with a sealed fate that scared both his mother and father right from the beginning.

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Violet Falgout Carrie Crockett English II Honors 2/28/23 Oedipus: Guilty or Innocent? Whether Oedipus killed his father, Laius, and married his mother, Jocasta, in the play Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, is intended to have an obvious answer: “Yes!”. But while all the evidence provided in the play points to it, if you examine the work more closely, it can be found that all the evidence presented is purely circumstantial, and in the context of Greek culture murder (not of one’s parents) was not taken as a grave offense as it is in contemporary culture, leaving Oedipus’ true guilt at most indeterminable if not innocent.

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1273 Words | 6 Pages

Repeatedly, others gave him chances to ignore reality and instead stay blind. However, he valued fact over happiness and persisted. He would never have blinded himself or requested to be exiled if he had not discovered the truth. An example of Oedipus forcing the truth is on page 177 of Oedipus the King at Tiresias’ arrival. Tiresias immediately began by asking Oedipus to send him home and offered a chance for Oedipus to stay blind instead.

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Oedipus takes responsibility for his actions by blinding himself. He blinded himself because what good were eyes to him if he did not see that Jocasta is his mother and that he is ultimately bringing himself to his own downfall. Oedipus understands that his fate is inevitable and that he must ultimately and fatally own whatever is his. Men live in a world not made for Man The Knower and can truly do nothing to escape their fate, since their fate cannot be escaped, men must choose to own their actions.

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And later, married Jocasta - Laius' widow thus, his mother. Throughout the play, Oedipus wanted to have control over everything that was going on, and over everyone involved with him and his family. He started as the most powerful character in the play and ended up being the weakest one due to his need and urge to control even the unpredictable and to know the answer and reason for everything. It all turned into what's called rationality vs. fate because by wanting to find out who killed Laius (rationality) - to make sure that the prophecy wasn't true(fate) - Oedipus was fighting fate but the more he and Jocasta, his mom/wife, kept running away from it, the faster they brought it to themselves. Therefore,

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947 Words | 4 Pages

However, he does not know his parents are not his biological parents. Once he abandons them, he influences the catastrophes of King Laius’s murder, the death of Jocasta, and his own downfall. The tragic flaws of Oedipus become a catalyst

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In Oedipus the King, by Sophocles, Oedipus continually attempts to change his fate. His actions, however, directly result in the outcome he has tried to escape. In accordance with a prophecy, Oedipus kills his father and marries his mother. Upon discovering what he has done, in a dramatic act with many witnesses present, Oedipus gouges out his own eyes in despair. Despite all of his attempts at evasion, Oedipus finds that his fate is inevitable, and that he can never go against the gods’ intentions.

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562 Words | 3 Pages

Same as his parents, Oedipus does not compromise to the oracle easily, but his efforts are not efficient at all. Throughout his life, he endeavors to remedy his fate, but he still follows the gods’ plan unwittingly. When he first heard the prophecy, he banished himself from Corinth driven by the fear of killing his father and marrying his mother. Oedipus thought he would successfully avoid the fate as he “[ran] to a place where [he] would never see that shameful prophecy come true” (Sophocles 45). Ironically, during his exile, he accidentally killed his true father and married his mother.

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619 Words | 3 Pages

Oedipus states, “ I, Oedipus. Oedipus, damned in his birth, in his marriage damned, damned in the blood he shed with his own hand!” (Sophocles 36). Oedipus admits that his downfall is his and his alone. His over confidence in himself caused him to not see the truth that he has fulfilled his prophecy.

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622 Words | 3 Pages

Unlike some other characters, Oedipus’s fate appears to be predetermined. For example, characters like Creon, who are not involved in the prophecy, can do as they please and have free will. In contrast, characters that are involved in the prophecy, specifically Jocasta, Oedipus, and Laius, do not have free will and no matter what they do, their fate is still the same. Although at the start of the tragedy Oedipus appears to have free will, near the middle this soon changes and what he does to try and change his fate does not do anything. Furthermore, much to his dismay, Oedipus, trying to bring Laius’s slayer to justice, ends up sentencing himself.

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