Free Oedipus The King Essays: Fate Or Free Will?

Fate or free will? Paulo Coelho once said: “I can control my destiny, but not my fate. Destiny means there are opportunities to turn right or left, but fate is a one-way street. I believe we all have the choice as to whether we fulfill our destiny, but our fate is sealed.” According to oxford dictionary, fate is the development of events outside a person’s control, regarded as predetermined by a super natural power. But destiny is a group of events will necessarily happen to a particular person or thing in the future. Fate is inevitable, but destiny is not. As we cannot determine fate, and the things going to happened in the future, we can control ourselves and the way we will

For example, Oedipus curiosity to know the truth, even though many tried to hide the truth from him. Like Jocasta, Creon, Theresias, and the messenger. He always pushed them to speak, like the conversation between the messenger and Oedipus. “I wish to God I would die that day” . the messenger said. And Oedipus replied ”you have got your wish if you don’t tell the truth” . He is not pushing them to speak, he forces them using the power of his position . In addition to the reason behind Oedipus’s escape is knowing his fate and that he is going to kill his father and marry his mother. So he ran from it, and he did not know that he is running towards it. His curiosity and insistence to revel the truth made him follow his passion and never listen to anybody, hence he made bad choices. This shows that he is not thinking of his doing, he was not a “Victim of fate” only, but a “victim of passion”. What he seems to care about is just knowing the truth under any circumstances, even if it caused the destruction of

And fate controlled his actions. And the way he behaves that is because he is cursed. His knowing of the curse leads him to run and escape from it in hope to defeat it. Because going through the text we could notice that one on the main themes is blindness. Blindness is mentioned as a sign for the curse, and it might lead to his irrationality, when Tiresias said to Oedipus “you are blind to the corruption of your life” . It means that the curse affected him and caused his blindness, from what he is already knew since he was born. Consequently, his reactions also were affected. That’s true, but at the end of the story, Oedipus blinded himself as a punishment and took responsible for his undoing and committed it saying “the hand that stuck my eyes was mine, mistake no one else I did it all my self” . A question to think about is why would Oedipus blame and punish himself, even though he recognized his misfortune and that he is predestined from Gods. Of course he is responsible for that irrationality. He choose blind himself instead of making better choices, then his fate won at the