Preview

Faith In Oedipus Rex Essay

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1492 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Faith In Oedipus Rex Essay
Oedipus Rex had many different ironies portrayed throughout the play. Some would say faith played a huge part of the story also. Oedipus rex was a tale of a man that had to overcome adversity through his journey. His parents left him as an infant and never looked backed. As the time went on he got older and wiser. When he got older an oracle told him that he was going to kill his father and impregnate his mother. These were the two main ironies portrayed in the story. The slaughter of Oedipus’ father, the incestual relationship with his mother, and his faith of being able to defy fate played a huge role in Oedipus Rex. Oedipus did not know his real parents. The King of Corinth was his foster dad. The king gave him the name Oedipus, because …show more content…
We see the ironies and faith taking course in everyday life. People thinking of making a right instead of a left turn can lead to many different outcomes or faiths at the end of the road. Some people become rich because of the faith their ancestors left them. Others stay poor because of the bad faith that was unfortunately left for them. People get arrested every day because of the ironies that portrays them during that day. The phase “At the wrong place at the wrong time” focused mainly on the role of faith. It was faith that brought a person to this exact moment in life. The irony is that there was probably a chance that the person could of change their faith by doing something else either if the action was big or small. The ironies and symbols of faith that happened to Oedipus also happens to man now a days. Some of the events portrayed in Oedipus could happen in real life. People try to run away from their faith all the time just to end of doing the things that they are running from. The best example of this is people that’s in prison or jail. They knew their faith when they commit a crime. There are only 2 out comes of their faith either to take the consequences that follow with their actions or run from them. The story of Oedipus shows that faith will always catch up with a person even if they want it to or

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    The ability to see is a much more complex ability than just the physical attribute. Most individuals have the ability to see physically but are blind to the reality of certain circumstances. In the play, “Oedipus the King” by Plato, Oedipus, the tragic hero, is not a blind man but cannot see the reality in the outcome of trying to escape his given fate.…

    • 435 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Oedipus has a sense of curiosity about his childhood and he looks for the answers. As a child, he experiences an event with an inebriated man who tells Oedipus that he is not the son of his parents, Polybus and Meropê. Oedipus, perplexed and annoyed, he asks his parents if this is an…

    • 983 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    People read literature because it teaches about humanity, both the positives and negatives. Sometimes, they learn more from reading about the mistakes and flaws of characters. Oedipus Rex is one of these characters, flawed even though he thinks he is divine. According to Bernard Knox, “these attributes of divinity – knowledge, certainty, justice – are all qualities Oedipus thought he possessed – and that is why he was the perfect example of the inadequacy of human knowledge, certainty, and justice.” In Sophocles’ tragedy Oedipus Rex, Oedipus’s untimely fall is caused by his false certainty of knowledge, his rash actions done without that certainty, and his injustice toward those trying to warn him.…

    • 691 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Oedipus Flaws Essay

    • 697 Words
    • 3 Pages

    father, King Laius. Oedipus was already angry from leaving his “mom and dad” and His…

    • 697 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Oedipus Rex is an Athenian tragedy by Sophocles. It tells the story of a man named and Oedipus who runs away from Corinth becoming the King of Thebes unintentionally fulfilling a prophecy he was trying to avoid. When Oedipus is told that he has fulfilled the prophecy he was desperately trying to run away from he goes through stages of denial before finally accepting his fate but even then he hasn't fully accepted what he has done.Sophocles develops the theme that the truth is hard to accept.…

    • 878 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    As the children address Oedipus with remarks such as “You are not one of the immortal gods, we know; Yet we have come to you to make our prayer as to the man surest in mortal ways and wisest in the ways of God.” (1. Prologue. 35. 43.), the audience can understand Oedipus's role as king and the respect to his power, as with an irony on the fate bestowed upon our hero. As the fate of Oedipus is that of the tragic hero, Aristotle's descriptions of simple and complex plots within a tragedy lead to such “events that are fearful and pathetic" (Aristotle. 70). As Aristotle said that a tragedy should evoke two emotions: terror and pity, such that the audience is aroused with these feelings with the fate of Oedipus, but can relate and understand logically how such events took place.…

    • 776 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Oedipus Rex

    • 456 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The premise of the play is how Oedipus’s decisions unknowingly lead to his fate. Oedipus was free to make his own decisions, and his decisions tied in with his fate. Oedipus did not know that all his decisions would lead to the killing of his father and the marrying of his mother. Oedipus was a very stubborn and curious person; he forced the servant of Laios and also Teiresias to tell him the truth about his past, even though neither one wanted him to know the truth. The servant stated, “… if I speak the truth, I am worse than dead” (p.165). Both warned Oedipus that he did not want to…

    • 456 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Oedipus And Fences

    • 725 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Sophocles' Oedipus Rex revolves around the story of Oedipus, who now is King of Thebes, searching for the murderer of the past king. The tragedy is not so much that Oedipus is the murderer and committing incest with his mother. After all, he was fated to do so, and Oedipus commits these crimes unknowingly. The real tragedy of Oedipus is his trying to defy his destiny and compounding the troubles with his pride. Oedipus has the chance to stop the search for the murderer before the investigation starts. Even blind Teiresias, who tells Oedipus that he is the guilty party, wants Oedipus to stop although Teiresias can see the outcome and knows Oedipus' destiny. It is Oedipus' pride that, in telling the members of his court that he will search for the murderer, leads him down the ever narrowing path to the truth and his pride that will not allow him to stop the search.…

    • 725 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The entire story of Oedipus is built around a central ironic theme. The king's world is one full of ironies, most of which are cruel. His life begins in exile, because his father fears a prophecy, one in which his son would kill him and marry his wife. It is this…

    • 597 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    When Oedipus was just a baby he was taken away from Thebes to be left on a barren mountain to die after a terrible oracle was told to his father, Laius. Growing up as a child Oedipus always thought his adoptive parents were his real parents. Little did he know that his real mother and father still existed. Oedipus was raised by Polybus and Merope, members of the royal family. Oedipus grew up believing that the royal family of Corinth was his biological family; he was never told that he was adopted. This is the first instance where it is apparent that Oedipus himself was truly "blind" to the knowledge of his history, which will later on affect him negatively.…

    • 648 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Man can try his best to control his fate, but, ultimately, he is blind to what is actually going to come. Oedipus lived in a figurative state of blindness. Because he was human, he was blinded to his doom. It wasn’t until this harsh realization that Oedipus saw he couldn’t control his fate. When Oedipus gained sight of what his life had become, he decided to take his eyesight away crying out, “What good was left for my eyes to see? Nothing in this world could I see now with a glad heart” (Sophocles 1520-1522). Oedipus never experienced life on earth without some form of blindness. Oedipus’ life is, unfortunately, a result of human nature. Man can be both physically blinded and live in darkness, and man can be figuratively blinded from that of which only the gods can foresee. Both forms of blindness, brought on by consequences of the flesh, can hinder the joyfulness one experiences in…

    • 610 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Oedipus Essay

    • 775 Words
    • 4 Pages

    rule of thebes: "What is it that walks on 4 feet and 2 feet and 3 feet…

    • 775 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Oedipus Essay

    • 963 Words
    • 4 Pages

    "What walks on four legs at dawn, two legs at noon, and three legs at nightfall." This was the riddle posed by the Sphinx who at the time was destroying the city of Thebes. The riddle was solved by none other than Oedipus who was made king for ridding the city of the Sphinx. Ironically though, Oedipus in his life comes to embody the riddle of the Sphinx and its soulution. Firstly, the Sphinx is percieved as a curse on Thebes and Oedipus also becomes a curse by the end of the play. Secondly, Oedipus's physical health embodies the riddle. Thirdly, Oedipus's emotional state also resembles the riddle. Lastly, the events of Oedipus's life relate to the theme of identity in the play.…

    • 963 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Oedipus the King Essay

    • 529 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Sight and Blindness has many different meanings throughout the world. The concept of blindness can be seen as the literal inability to look at the world and it is also perceived as being blind to a situation or event that is obvious. The Sophocles Tragedy, Oedipus the King, portrays both of the viewpoints of sight and blindness. The characters in Sophocles’ work live a hectic, ever-changing, life with twists of fate.…

    • 529 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    One of Oedipus’ mistakes was being ignorant to who his real parents were. Oedipus had discovered rumors that the people he thought were his birth parents were not who they said they were. He had a feeling that the rumors were true, but he foolishly did not make an effort to uncover the truth. Even when the oracle revealed Oedipus to his fate, he did not question who his parents were. Oedipus assumed it was referring to the people he considered his parents, his adoptive parents in Corinth. To avoid fulfilling the prophecy, Oedipus left his home. He didn’t understand that by abandoning his home, he would collide with his…

    • 583 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays