Life Mystery

Mysteries and investigations is something that has catch everyone's attention at one time or another. From finding out how something occur to a murder scene investigation, these mysteries play an important role in the persons life and/or families/relatives. However, the knowledge gained through the investigation and mystery could be more important than the answer itself. In Sophocles's "Oedipus Rex" the king is faced with this same dilemma. This search/investigation for an answer illuminates the work as whole in the process.

Oedipus, king of Thebes sets out on a path to find out who murder/killed king Laios, the previous king of Thebes, but only to meet the grim and dark fate that awaited him. Oedipus who try to avoid his destiny of murdering his father and sleeping with his mother flees to Thebes where he solves a riddle imposed by the Sphinx which was destroying Thebes with famine and chaos.

Cadmus Sowing the Dragon's teeth, by Maxfield Parr...

This image was first published in the 1 st (1876&n...

Oedipus slaying the sphinx. Attic red-figured leky...

After resolving the riddle with a simple word "Man" he takes the throne of King Laios due to his heroic action and Laios death. After many years of happy marriage with Iocaste, wife of previous king and now Oedipus, he sets out in the path which will lead him to the murderer of king Laios and his own misery.

He finds the murderer of the king, only to realize that it was him. While this investigation/mystery reached a solution, Oedipus learn a more valuable lesson, that of pride and reasoning. His fate which Teiresias foreseen was seen as an insult and joke to Oedipus. While he could have avoided knowing this harsh truth by just listening to the poor blind man(Teiresias) "Your enemy is yourself" his pride and lack of reasoning blinded him from seeing the obvious answer/truth.

A man can be define by his characteristic...