Kayla Salazar
June 10, 2015
Charlie Steen
HIST 101
Assignment #1
In my opinion the Theban Plays, Antigone, Oedipus the King and Oedipus at Calonna were all so very horrifying. Sophocles is the author of The Theban Plays who also wrote several more. It was said that he was concerned with the individual struggle people had with fate. Each of his stories involves a lesson that he wanted to teach the audience. Still to this day the lessons can be taught to people. The plays would include fate, loyalty, courage, politics, religion and morality. Critics have said that the most popular play by Sophocles is Oedipus the King. Oedipus is the protagonist and the antagonist is fate. The three plays include religion and political life. During that time religion was based on Mythology and the laws of the gods. In the play of Oedipus the King the plot was based on god-given prophesy or how others would call it spoken fate. The prophecy told to his parents was that one day Oedipus would kill his father and marry his mother. Immediately after hearing this prophecy his parents ordered his death to protect them. The ancient Greeks believed that the gods had higher power and were in control of human destiny. They also believed that the gods controlled everything, from weather, prosperity and poverty. Oedipus’s brother-in-law is off seeking the advice of Apollo. Being god of truth the Greeks sought for answers from Apollo.
Creon the king and also the uncle to Antigone, banned the burial of Polyneices and Antigone disobeyed and buried her brother anyway. Doing that act Creon put her in prison and caused her to kill herself. Although she broke the law she says she did out of respect for divine law, which takes precedence over man-made law. She says, “Yea, for these laws were not ordained of Zeus, and she who sits enthroned with gods below, Justice, enacted not these human laws. Nor did I deem that thou, a mortal man, Could'st by a breath annul and override the immutable unwritten laws of Heaven.”
Another quote from Antigone is, “All wise are Zeus and Apollo, and nothing is hid from their ken; They are gods; and in wits a man may surpass his fellow men; But that a mortal seer knows more than I know—where Hath this been proven?” She believed like many others that Zeus, god of the Olympians, was in control of their destiny. Ancient Greeks believe that the sins of their fathers were inherited to their children. The children of Oedipus must had to be punished because of his wicked acts. His two sons kill each other in battle, his daughter kills herself and the other daughter witnesses all these events and becomes emotional distraught.
The Greeks were always
