Oedipus Rex

That he will identify and punish the guilty and thereby avenge the gods, Laius and Thebans and protect himself is what Oedipus promises in lines 138-147 of the play "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, line counts are not the same across the play's different editions. But it seems likely that the reference is to the end of Theban King's interaction with the priest of Zeus and the suppliants outside the royal Palace of Thebes. Oedipus makes his mission personal and indicates that he will not give up until divinely-expressed will is carried out, justice is done and Thebes is pestilence-free.

That he likes to interact directly and openly with his people and keep them informed is what the line "Speak out to all" reveals in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. -- 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, the statement is Theban King Oedipus' answer to Creon, his brother-in-law and royal colleague. Creon offers to go inside and in private tell Oedipus about the results of his visit to the oracle at Apollo's shrine. Oedipus prefers to have his people hear the news now instead of later.

Theban King Oedipus appears to be the kind of sovereign who's popular with his people. He appears to be an effective problem solver and a protector of his city and its inhabitants. He also appears to be an open communicator. For example, he wants to hear what his brother-in-law and uncle, Theban King Creon, has to say at the same time as Thebans, and not in advance or in private. At the same time, he appears to like to dominate in a power sharing arrangement with Theban Queen Jocasta and Theban King Creon.

So perhaps Oedipus' type of rule over Thebes and Thebans is described best as benevolently despotic. In fact, such a description fits well with the original Greek title for the play by Sophocles [496 B.C.E.-406 B.C.E.]. According to the original Greek, Oedipus is a tyrant. Tyrannical rule in ancient Greece refers to the taking of power by illegal means. And that's what Thebans learn: Oedipus takes power by killing previous Theban King Laius, who is his sovereign and his father. The taking of power by even the unknowing killing of father and king is considered heinously illegal in Greek political thought, religious beliefs, and dramatic literature.

An end to the plague that devastates their city is what Thebans gather to beg of Theban King Oedipus. The Theban townspeople see Oedipus as a brave individual who solves challenging problems. It's a conclusion that's based on their first interactions with their future king.

Specifically, Oedipus arrives at Thebes, to find the city groaning under a heavy tax burden that the Sphinx demands. Additionally, the Sphinx is causing an alarming population decline and giving the city a bad reputation in the process. She subjects all those who try to go back and forth from Thebes to a riddle. The lack of an answer or an incorrect reply results in the person's death. It's only Oedipus who correctly identifies humans as the only life forms that get around on fours in the morning of life, on twos in the afternoon, and on threes in the evening.

It is after Oedipus asks for details of Laius' death that the messenger tells Oedipus of his father's death in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Theban King Oedipus finds out that he must solve King Laius' murder in order for the pestilence to end in Thebes. He looks for information from Queen Jocasta, his wife and Laius' widow. Jocasta provides details on the where, when and how of Laius' death. These details in the first half of the play raise questions that begin to be answered in the second half. For example, the Corinthian messenger supplies information about the death of Corinthian King Polybus, Oedipus' presumed father.

It is by not carrying out cleansing rituals and by not looking into his royal predecessor's death that Oedipus causes problems in Thebes in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Oedipus commits five murders before coming to Thebes. He does not go through mandatory purification procedures with which he is very familiar as a royal. He then finds out that he can marry the beautiful widowed Queen, whose husband's murder he does not look into even though, once again, he is a royal and knows about mandatory cleansing rituals. This is all very polluting for Thebes and Thebans.

The original title, in Greek, is : Οἰδίπους Τύραννος. The author, Sophocles of Greece, is thought to have written the play, one of three pertaining to the life of Oedipus and his children by Sophocles (known as the Theban Plays) sometime around 432 B.C.E.* Scholars indicate that the origins of the story are far older.

Variations in the translation and spelling of the original Greek title abound, as do variations in the translation of the work as a whole.

In Latin, the title was translated as "Oedipus Rex." However, the original Greek title was also used, transliterated into Latin, as "Oedipus Tyrannvs."

Latin lacks the letter "u, " using, instead, the letter "v." So it seems that, in many cases, the Latin transliteration of the Greek title has been transliterated into English as "Oedipus Tyrannus."

Transliteration of the original Greek title directly into English results in the variant spelling, "Oidipous Tyrannos."

More recent translations, in English, commonly give the title as "Oedipus the King."

According to Arlene Saxonhouse ( The Tyranny of Reason in the World of the Polis, Arlene Saxonhouse, University of Michigan. The American Political Science Review, Vol. 82 No. 4, December 1988), "The tyrannos is the new ruler, the one who has come to power in the city by means other than birth or established precedent. Therewith his illegitimacy - but also his freedom... Among the ancient Greeks, tyranny incorporated a freedom to break away from what was old and limiting. Released from traditions, the tyrant could transform the world in which people lived."

*Before the Christian Era.

In Greek, it is known as Oedipus Tyrannos. But the title should only be 'Oedipus'

Employees of the respectively royal houses of Corinth and Thebes are the identities of the messenger in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, the first messenger to appear is the Corinthian messenger. He informs Theban monarchs Oedipus and Jocasta of the death of Corinthian King Polybus and of the consequent royal job opening in Corinth. He subsequently is followed by the messenger of Thebes' own royal house. He announces that Queen Jocasta is dead and that King Oedipus is blind.

It is to no longer see an incestuous relationship that the servant reports as Oedipus' explanation for his self-mutilation in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, the servant exits from the palace to inform the chorus of the goings-on inside. He indicates that disgraced Theban King Oedipus now is blind. He states that Oedipus announces his determination never to see the incestuous mess of his marriage and plunges his wife's brooches deep into both eyes.

That two men do not die in the way described by the prophecies is the argument that Jocasta uses to persuade Oedipus to ignore soothsayers and oracles in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, a prophecy warns that Theban King Laius will be killed by his own son. But Theban Queen Jocasta, Laius' widow and Oedipus' wife, points out that her first husband dies at the hands of strangers and robbers in Phocis. Then she brings up Corinthian King Polybus, who also is supposed to die at the hands of his son, Oedipus. But once again, Jocasta points out that the Corinthian monarch dies of illness and old age.

The getting of specific information about the murder of Theban King Laius is why Theban King Oedipus wants to see the sole survivor of that crime. Oedipus at first accepts hearsay information. He finds nothing questionable in the information that Laius and all but one of his escorts were attacked and killed by robbers. But then he learns that the killings took place at a crossroads somewhere between Delphi and Thebes.

Around the time of that killing, Oedipus was carrying out his own bloodbath. He took the lives of a stranger who was old enough to be his father, and whom he resembled, and of the stranger's companions. The killings all happened at that same crossroads.

So Oedipus needs to find out whether Laius was killed by a lone perpetrator or if he met death at the hands of a group of thugs. Such information only can be gotten from the sole survivor. That survivor can be counted on to tell the truth. He in fact is the most devoted and trusted servant of Theban Queen Jocasta, wife of Laius and wife and mother of Oedipus.

Murder, blasphemy and incest are the crimes that Oedipus commits in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Theban King Oedipus becomes a killer when he lethally defends himself against five of six overbearing people at the Delphi-Daulia intersection in Phocis. He commits blasphemy when he neglects mandatory cleansing rituals after his crime and King Laius' death. He engages in incest when he marries and has children with his mother.