Friedrich Nietzche stated “The edge of wisdom is turned against the wise man; wisdom is a crime committed on nature”: such are the terrible words addressed to us by myth. ” (136). The tragic Greek play Oedipus Tyrannus, by Sophocles, seems to present Oedipus both as having free will to make decisions and also being the victim of fate, which the Greeks believed to guide the universe.
Oedipus was acting freely of his own free will throughout the play and by pushing for answers in the fashion that he did, Oedipus gained knowledge that ultimately caused his downfall.When Creon returns from Apollo’s Pythian shrine with news regarding how the city of Thebes might be saved, he offers Oedipus the opportunity to hear this news in private. This is a chance for Oedipus to weigh the information and make a careful decision about how to proceed, but he chooses instead to have the entire dialog with Creon for all to see. The cause of the plague is the murder of King Laius, and this crime has to be solved in order to remove the plague and save the city of Thebes. Oedipus, acting of his own free will, agrees to find this man and punish him.
With a degree of pride, he states, “On the assassin or assassins, I call down the most vile damnation-for this vicious act, may the brand of shame be theirs to wear forever. And if I knowingly harbor their guilt within my own walls, I shall not exempt myself from the curse that I have called upon them” (8). He is in fact cursing himself and this foreshadows events later in the play. Oedipus furthermore pushes for answers from Teiresias, despite harsh warnings from him that the answers he seeks will only bring him grief.
Teiresias finally admits, “I say that you, Oedipus Tyrannus, are the murderer you seek! ” (10). This only enrages Oedipus and leads him to accuse Teiresias of plotting with Creon to overthrow the throne he occupies. Creon offers insight to the bad choices that Oedipus makes, stating, “You are hard when you should yield, cruel when you should pity. Such natures deserve the pain they bear” (16).
This again foreshadows the self-inflicted fate awaiting Oedipus. The audience learns later that Oedipus in fact harbored deep concerns about his fate from the time he fled Corinth.He himself had heard a prophecy from Apollo, “…how I would know my mother’s bed and bring to the world a race of children too terrible for men to see and cause the death of my own father” (18, 19). He shares a recollection with Jocasta of an incident where he in fact murdered two strangers on the very path where the king was said to have been slain. At the very start of this impulsive act, Oedipus could simply have chosen to step aside the path and let the carriage pass, but in a display of self-importance refuses, leading to the confrontation that results in his father’s death.Oedipus had the free will to keep going further in his journey, and chooses to do so even when he may have suspected that the ending is not well.
“O God! Am I cursed and cannot see it? ” (18). Regardless of his deepest fears, he keeps pushing towards his own destruction. Oedipus could have chosen to assume that Teiresias was a false prophet and that Creon was just trying to steal the throne from him. He could have chosen to accept Jocasta’s assurance that robbers had killed the king and that she herself was sure of her child’s death at the hand of Laius.Oedipus couldn’t choose the life he was born into (fate), but he chose the path from that point onward (free will) that was not governed by destiny.
The belief in Greek culture was that one would be the same way in the afterlife as they were when they died. For that reason, Oedipus chooses to blind himself so in the afterlife he won't have to look upon his mother whom he bedded, his father whom he killed, and his monstrous children whom he gave birth to. He was cursed, blinded and banished – all of his own free will.
