Chance Vs. Destiny In Oedipus The King

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Chance vs. Destiny in Oedipus the King
The famous Athenian tragedy, Oedipus the King, engages with the question of chance versus destiny from a range of perspectives. Sophocles shows the immutable nature of destiny and the inability of victims to escape its course. The main character, Oedipus, is marked out for a tragic end from the time he is born until the supreme moment of the inglorious fulfillment. Despite his best efforts to alter the course of his “destiny”, Oedipus ends up in the exact scenario that is foretold by the Delphic Oracle. In this sense, the Oracle reveals the roadmap of events that must take place towards the tragedy. Through the characters of Oedipus and Laius, Sophocles conveys the meaning that tragic destinies are authored …show more content…

In fact, he was born as a child of privilege given that he was the heir to the kingdom of Thebes being the son of King Laius and Queen Jocasta (Sophocles 72). The tragic dimensions of the story begin after King Laius learns from an oracle that his demise shall occur by the hand of his own son. The king is desperate to avoid the cruel hand of fate and decides that their baby must die. At this point, it is clear that all his efforts are trained towards altering the dimensions of fate and destiny. His actions are illustrative of the earnest desire by the human agent to condition and direct life by the power of will. The outcome of his actions will demonstrate the level of influence that a person can have over …show more content…

In order to appreciate this truth, it becomes necessary to review the encounter between Oedipus and King Laius on the way to Thebes as he fled Corinth (Sophocles 72). In every respect, the meeting was by chance, but fate conditioned the two to quarrel over the right of way. The culmination of the quarrel into a fight that led to Laius 's death marks the point at which the first fulfillment of the tragedy occurs. Evidently, the workings of chance prepared the grounds on which the dimensions of fate played out in a pattern that proves the immutable profundity of destiny. In the same way, it was predestined that only Oedipus would have the perfect answer to the riddle of the sphinx. Obviously, the Sphinx would have killed him had he failed to answer correctly. Such was the fate that befell many others who traveled the same path and encountered the Sphinx with his

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