ients would see as an example of divine will.”It can be argued that Oedipus could have lived with himself in the condition he was in. His fate, that he would bed his mother and kill his father, certainly comes true, however the gods do not prophesize his downfall nor banishment. Frederick Ahl agrees that Oedipus serves his own destruction. He says that Oedipus thinks he is the victim of an unfortunate fate while at the same time he is aware that he is partly at fault for his downfall (Ahl 147). In the Exodus, Creon says to Oedipus “Think no longer / That you are in command here, but rather think / How, when you were, you served your own destruction” (289-91). He, not the gods, brings his exile and self-mutilation upon himself through his incessant quest for the truth. Iocaste does not have to kill herself either; that is an action she certainly controls herself. The gods only predict the previously mentioned oracles; the rest of the wretchedness is caused by the characters themselves: as the Second Messenger says in the Exodus, “The greatest griefs are those we cause ourselves” (9).The audience may never know for sure whether or not Oedipus’s actions are of his own free will or if the gods control them. Some believe that “the human beings act as they do because a god has so willed it” (Knox 34). There is evidence that many believed in the prophecies of the gods, however, many were still skeptical. Whether or not fate is the eternal power of all action is a rather large controversy in society. After all, if fate exists, then Oedipus was created to kill his father and marry his mother: a rather harsh outlook for a baby that hasn’t yet seen the light of the world. Works Cited* Ahl, Frederick. Sophocles’ Oedipus. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991.* Donohue, Harold. “Multiculturalism, questioning authority, and Oedipus Tyrannus.” Galaleo. September 1992. T...
