Oedipus - Summary

Oedipus Being touched with the same hands that were once stained with the blood of her own husband. Jocasta preached to never trust a man who spoke of oracles but gave up her own blood, her son, and trusting in one. Hypocritical, don’t you think? Oedipus is a greek mythology based on the life of the very own, Oedipus, the greek king of Thebes. From day one Oedipus is pretty much born with a curse, a prophecy, so sickening that ruined his chances of having a happy life. The Oracle of Delphi spoke to King Laius of Thebes, (Father of Oedipus) and Queen Jocasta (Mother of Oedipus) before their child was born about the prophecy that was about to take place, both the king and queen decided to act on it before it was too late. The prophecy was that they will have a child who’s destined to not only kill his own father, but to also sleep with his own mother, both very disturbing. When the day comes and Jocasta gives birth to their one and only son, afraid that the prophecy might come true, they decide to give up their only child, but when the time approaches, Jocasta can’t go through with the plan, so instead she pierced his ankles, (that’s actually where the name Oedipus comes from which pretty much means swollen ankles because of the way the pins had swollen them up) and decides to leave him by the mountainside where he will eventually die, well at least that’s what she hoped for. As a shepherd was walking along the mountain, he comes upon the baby and takes him to King Polybus and Queen Merope of Corinth, who cannot have kids, to care for him.They take the baby in to raise him as their own and gave him the name of “Oedipus.” Time passes, Oedipus grows up thinking that King Polybus and Queen Merope are his real parents, until one day, during a feast, a drunk calls out that they aren’t his real parents, which to me is pretty much the turning point of the story. Oedipus tired of the lies and wanting to find out the actual truth turns to visiting the Oracle of Delphi to find out who his real parents are. The Oracle of Delphi doesn’t think it’s her who necessarily needs to tell him this so instead she explains the prophecy to him that says that Oedipus is destined to kill his father and sleep with his mother. Like any other person, Oedipus is confused maybe a little scared of the prophecy and that’s where he decides to never come back home, where his “parents” King Polybus and Queen Merope live. He come upon a group of people where three roads meet and they basically tell him to get out the way, Oedipus says no, and a fight breaks out, Oedipus ends up killing these guys, one of them being his legit father, which of course he doesn’t know about during that time. He ends up in Thebes where there’s major chaos because their king is nowhere to be found and a Sphinx has settle down right outside their city. A sphinx is a creature who asks people a riddle and if they can’t solve it, then he kills them. Creon, Jocasta’s brother, who has now in charge of Thebes, offered the hand of the queen to anyone who can’t figure out the riddle, Oedipus decides he will take it on. The riddle goes like this, “Which creature walks on four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon, and three legs in the evening?” Oedipus answers correctly by saying “Man” Since he figured out the riddle in return he becomes King of Thebes and marries Jocasta, his mother? Of course not knowing that was his mother. Years past, they have kids and everything seems to be going well until, out of nowhere a terrible plague comes through Thebes and everything begins to slowly fall apart. Creon is send to The Oracle of Delphi to find out what’s going on, only to hear that the killer of Laius is living in Thebes and needs to be expelled. Creon tells Oedipus to speak to Tiresias, a seer, an old blind man, who knows everything and so he does At first Tiresias doesn’t want to tell Oedipus the truth but eventually caves in and tells him that he, himself is the person they are all looking for, of course Oedipus doesn’t believe him. Jocasta tries to comfort Oedipus by telling him that it couldn’t have been him because Laius was killed by some robbers where three roads meet and that’s where Oedipus realizes that it was him all along. During this, a messenger from Corinth shows up to inform Oedipus that King Polybus has passed away. Having this happening, Oedipus becomes relieved because he thinks this means the prophecy was a lie because he didn’t kill Polybus, “His father.” The messenger turns out to be the shepherd who found Oedipus on the mountain and took him to Corinth and tells him that Polybus and Merope weren’t his parents. Meanwhile Jocasta remembers the prophecy from long ago, that made her abandon her only child and puts it all together but yet not telling Oedipus about it… At this very moment we realize what type of person Jocasta really is. For a character who spoke so little in this epic play somehow created the most controversy. Even after putting things together and finding out the truth, she continues to be with her husband/son. Instead of letting go and explaining the shame in their relationship to Oedipus, she instead begs him to not pursue the truth any further, why? Because she doesn’t want him to find out that all this time he’s been sleeping with his own mother, making Jocasta hypocritical and a lair, which is the Jocasta we see throughout the whole play. Jocasta didn’t follow her own advice. She told Oedipus not to trust the prophecies by saying, “I beg you- do not hunt this out- I beg you, if you have any care for your own life. What I am suffering is enough” then later one she mentions, “O Oedipus, God help you! God keep you from the knowledge of who you are” because she didn’t want him to find out the actual truth, yet she trusted and feared the prophecies which were the reason she decided to give up her own son by leaving him to die by the mountainside in the beginning. Also like I mentioned in the beginning, she loses her husband and marries his killer. Her whole life was a bucket of lies. She was ashamed of her life of dishonestly, held so much shame from sleeping with her son and having kids with him that she hanged herself. From the moment she found out that Oedipus was her son, wasn’t telling him the truth, the right way to put things out? Or was she willing to live in incest with her son as long as he nor the town didn’t know? Did she kill herself because she couldn’t bare to see Oedipus face when he figured out the truth or because she couldn’t face everyone else? Although some may say that Jocasta didn’t tell Oedipus the truth and killed herself because she was ashamed of her actions, I believe otherwise. I felt like she was just trying to keep him innocence in his knowledge of their relationship. All in all, Jocasta was to me a hypocrite, due to all her actions and choice of the small amount of words she spoke in the play.