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[Abstract] In the traditional view, the tragedy of Oedipus is the tragedy of fate which predicted by the oracle. This paper posts its suspect to this view. Based on the analysis of Oedipus’ character and the relations between human’s free will, character and fate, this paper shows that a person’s character affects his choice, meanwhile, it is choice, to a larger degree, determines a person’s fate. By analyzing the original work, this paper reveals that the tragedy of Oedipus is actually formed by his series of choices which affected by his character. And it also can be seen as the embodying of his free will. Therefore, to some degree, the tragedy of Oedipus is actually the tragedy of human’s free will.
[Key words] free will; fate; character; choice
1. Free Will, Fate and Character
1.1 Free Will and Fatalism
Fatalism is in general the view which holds that all events in the history of the world, and, in particular, the actions and incidents which make up the story of each individual life are determined by fate. (Maher, Michael, 1909) It means that many things are out of our control, the events are fixed in advance so that human beings are powerless to change them. In the face of the world, human is so puny. The Greek tragedians frequently depict man as a helpless creature borne along by destiny. In the traditional Christian theology, fatalism is the doctrine of a personal God possessing an infallible foreknowledge of the future and an omnipotence regulating all events of the universe intensified some phases of the difficulty. (Maher, Michael, 1909) God is omniscient and omnipotent and always can foresee what choices individual will make and actually God determine those choices. With his omnipotence, he can control the factors that affect individual’s choices so God controls the human being’s fate that no one can escape from it.
This view of fatalism actually denies the existence of human being’s free will. Free will is the view that each human being can by his own free will determine his deliberate volitions and so exercises a real command over his thoughts, his deeds, and the formation of his character. (Maher, Michael, 1909)It is the theory that human beings own the power of making choices freely without the restraints of external agencies; that is, that given a situation, a person could have done other than what he did. It denies the view of fatalism that human beings are determined by fate; it is the view that a person’s choice determines his fate. Different choices may lead to different results. Even the tiny choice may affect a person’s life.
1.2 Free Will and Character
From the moment we are born, we begin to display certain distinctive character traits, which are then developed or modified in the course of our lives as we react to circumstances and interact with the people around us. But where does our basic character come from??Materialists say that our basic characters are determined by the genes we inherit from our parents, and by which of these genes are activated in our bodies. If asked what determines which genes are active and which are recessive, they would answer in a single word: chance. Chance means that things "happen" luckily, that things are not controlled and directed by God. According to chance, God can foresee what will happen, but that is all. Everything is of mere luck. And if the advocate of Chance is asked why or how things come to pass, he has no reply except to say that "it just happened." (David Pratt, 1997) However, besides genes, the character is also influenced by the environment people live. Clearly, the choices and decisions we make are greatly influenced by the habitual patterns of thought, feeling, and behavior arising from our past. That is, human beings may make choice rationally. On the other hand, according to the limited rationality, human beings may not be omniscient and omnipotent that even the rational choice may lead to wrong result. No matter rational or irrational, as long as man makes choices that will lead to relevant outcomes. That is to say, the fate of human beings mostly is the result of human’s free will.
Therefore, from this view, we may conclude the relation between free will and human’s fate and character as follows: character affects human’s choice, and the choice determines human’s fate.
2. Oedipus’s Character
Most people say Oedipus is irrational because of his rash behavior. On the contrary, we say Oedipus is rational. When the oracle gives him the horrific prediction: he will kill his father and sleep with his mother; he resolutely abandons the status of prince and determines to leave his family in case the oracle could conceivably come true accidentally. Later when Teiresias tells Oedipus that he is the killer, Oedipus is enraged, believing that Teiresias and Creon have concocted this story to dethrone him and seize power for themselves. People say that Oedipus is paranoid. However, thinking about that Oedipus was the king in Thebes, what he doubted is out of common sense of a king. Initially, Oedipus, still basking in the glory of having solved the riddle of the Sphinx and becomes the king of Thebes virtually overnight, exhibits great self-confidence in his wisdom, oblivious to the fact that his own identity remains concealed from himself. (傅守祥, 2006) He repeatedly asks the person who know his identity until he get an answer, which turns out to be that he has killed his father and married his mother.
However, Oedipus is the epitome of tragic heroes, doomed by the excess of passion within him and willing to take responsibility for his ensuing actions. Aristotle believed the cause of a character’s fall stemmed initially from an excessive passion. Oedipus’ excessive passion is his pursuit of the truth no matter what the cost is and a desire that stems from his pride of intellect. (杜慧颖, 2008) Oedipus is so prideful, and will not listen to the voices of the people around him. Many different characters give him excellent advice, but he chooses to ignore it and follows his own path that eventually leads to doom. If Oedipus has just taken the time to listen to the words of elder and wiser individuals, he may not have suffered the fate he did. He makes his pride get in the way of common sense, and it leads to tragedy for his family and his people. (孟德群, 2005) He loses his real mother and father, fathered two children in incest, and ends up blind and alone. This excessive passion Aristotle calls hubris. Because this excessive passion is not what is considered "appropriate" for the character, a mistake is made that is detrimental to him or her.
3. The Causes of Oedipus’s Tragedy
Oedipus is the epitome of tragic heroes. His tragedy is not determined by fate but his conceited character. (高岩, 2002) However, a person’s character will affect one’s choices which will affect one’s life. The cause of Oedipus’ tragedy owes to his series of choices which are made affected by his character.These choices are as follows:
First, when the oracle gives him the horrific prediction, he sets off in the opposite direction to Corinth, and heads towards Thebes. There are so many choices that he can make, however he only chooses the way to Thebes.
Second, as he descends from Parnassus towards the foothills, he gets to the place where three roads meet but he chooses the one that an old man who is driving a wagon with a retinue of slaves comes. The place where three roads meet also symbolizes the choice that different road leads to different result. It is not the god forces Oedipus to make a choice but he himself because human beings have free will to make a choice.
Third, he kills the old man at the age of his father, and marries the woman at the age of his mother. And before he marries Jocasta, he doesn’t make clear the death of the old king. If he gets the oracle’s prediction in heart, he can actually avoid making such a choice. He is so confident that since he leaves his country he can escape from the prediction.
All these choices are the outcome of his free will, the reflection of his free will and character. Oedipus is so hubris that he over-believes his choices are right regardless of finding out the reasons. According to the theory of free will, and the relation of free will and man’s character and fate, a person’s character affects his choice, and the choice determines his fate. In this view, the Oedipus’s tragedy is the tragedy of free will which was determined by his character rather than God.
4. Conclusion
In many of the Greek tragedies, fate sets the stage. Some curse must be fulfilled. A doom impends and is inexorable. But the actors on the stage are far from puppets. Within the framework of the inevitable the tragic hero works out his own destiny, making the choices from which his personal catastrophe ensues.However, Oedipus doomed to kill his father and marry his mother is not fated to inquire into his past and to discover the sins. Therefore, it is not the fate determines the tragedy but the human being’s free will shapes the tragedy. And Oedipus’s tragedy is the tragedy of free will which is affected by his character.
Works Cited
[1] David Pratt. Fate or Free Will [M].Theosophical University Press Agency, 1997. .
[2] Maher, Michael. “Free Will.” The Catholic Encyclopedia（Vol. 6）[M].New York: Robert Appleton Company,1909.
[3]杜慧颖.论俄狄浦斯走向毁灭的原因[J].重庆科技学院学报（社会科学版）， 2008(4)：122，124.
[4]傅守祥.俄狄浦斯王：命运主题与悲剧精神的现代性[J].世界文学评论，2006(1).
[5]高岩.罪恶还是清白——俄狄浦斯王悲剧成因之我见[J].锦州师范学院学报（哲学社会科学版），2002(6).
[6]孟德群.俄狄浦斯的错误及其人生启示意义[J].名作欣赏，2005(12).
[Key words] free will; fate; character; choice
1. Free Will, Fate and Character
1.1 Free Will and Fatalism
Fatalism is in general the view which holds that all events in the history of the world, and, in particular, the actions and incidents which make up the story of each individual life are determined by fate. (Maher, Michael, 1909) It means that many things are out of our control, the events are fixed in advance so that human beings are powerless to change them. In the face of the world, human is so puny. The Greek tragedians frequently depict man as a helpless creature borne along by destiny. In the traditional Christian theology, fatalism is the doctrine of a personal God possessing an infallible foreknowledge of the future and an omnipotence regulating all events of the universe intensified some phases of the difficulty. (Maher, Michael, 1909) God is omniscient and omnipotent and always can foresee what choices individual will make and actually God determine those choices. With his omnipotence, he can control the factors that affect individual’s choices so God controls the human being’s fate that no one can escape from it.
This view of fatalism actually denies the existence of human being’s free will. Free will is the view that each human being can by his own free will determine his deliberate volitions and so exercises a real command over his thoughts, his deeds, and the formation of his character. (Maher, Michael, 1909)It is the theory that human beings own the power of making choices freely without the restraints of external agencies; that is, that given a situation, a person could have done other than what he did. It denies the view of fatalism that human beings are determined by fate; it is the view that a person’s choice determines his fate. Different choices may lead to different results. Even the tiny choice may affect a person’s life.
1.2 Free Will and Character
From the moment we are born, we begin to display certain distinctive character traits, which are then developed or modified in the course of our lives as we react to circumstances and interact with the people around us. But where does our basic character come from??Materialists say that our basic characters are determined by the genes we inherit from our parents, and by which of these genes are activated in our bodies. If asked what determines which genes are active and which are recessive, they would answer in a single word: chance. Chance means that things "happen" luckily, that things are not controlled and directed by God. According to chance, God can foresee what will happen, but that is all. Everything is of mere luck. And if the advocate of Chance is asked why or how things come to pass, he has no reply except to say that "it just happened." (David Pratt, 1997) However, besides genes, the character is also influenced by the environment people live. Clearly, the choices and decisions we make are greatly influenced by the habitual patterns of thought, feeling, and behavior arising from our past. That is, human beings may make choice rationally. On the other hand, according to the limited rationality, human beings may not be omniscient and omnipotent that even the rational choice may lead to wrong result. No matter rational or irrational, as long as man makes choices that will lead to relevant outcomes. That is to say, the fate of human beings mostly is the result of human’s free will.
Therefore, from this view, we may conclude the relation between free will and human’s fate and character as follows: character affects human’s choice, and the choice determines human’s fate.
2. Oedipus’s Character
Most people say Oedipus is irrational because of his rash behavior. On the contrary, we say Oedipus is rational. When the oracle gives him the horrific prediction: he will kill his father and sleep with his mother; he resolutely abandons the status of prince and determines to leave his family in case the oracle could conceivably come true accidentally. Later when Teiresias tells Oedipus that he is the killer, Oedipus is enraged, believing that Teiresias and Creon have concocted this story to dethrone him and seize power for themselves. People say that Oedipus is paranoid. However, thinking about that Oedipus was the king in Thebes, what he doubted is out of common sense of a king. Initially, Oedipus, still basking in the glory of having solved the riddle of the Sphinx and becomes the king of Thebes virtually overnight, exhibits great self-confidence in his wisdom, oblivious to the fact that his own identity remains concealed from himself. (傅守祥, 2006) He repeatedly asks the person who know his identity until he get an answer, which turns out to be that he has killed his father and married his mother.
However, Oedipus is the epitome of tragic heroes, doomed by the excess of passion within him and willing to take responsibility for his ensuing actions. Aristotle believed the cause of a character’s fall stemmed initially from an excessive passion. Oedipus’ excessive passion is his pursuit of the truth no matter what the cost is and a desire that stems from his pride of intellect. (杜慧颖, 2008) Oedipus is so prideful, and will not listen to the voices of the people around him. Many different characters give him excellent advice, but he chooses to ignore it and follows his own path that eventually leads to doom. If Oedipus has just taken the time to listen to the words of elder and wiser individuals, he may not have suffered the fate he did. He makes his pride get in the way of common sense, and it leads to tragedy for his family and his people. (孟德群, 2005) He loses his real mother and father, fathered two children in incest, and ends up blind and alone. This excessive passion Aristotle calls hubris. Because this excessive passion is not what is considered "appropriate" for the character, a mistake is made that is detrimental to him or her.
3. The Causes of Oedipus’s Tragedy
Oedipus is the epitome of tragic heroes. His tragedy is not determined by fate but his conceited character. (高岩, 2002) However, a person’s character will affect one’s choices which will affect one’s life. The cause of Oedipus’ tragedy owes to his series of choices which are made affected by his character.These choices are as follows:
First, when the oracle gives him the horrific prediction, he sets off in the opposite direction to Corinth, and heads towards Thebes. There are so many choices that he can make, however he only chooses the way to Thebes.
Second, as he descends from Parnassus towards the foothills, he gets to the place where three roads meet but he chooses the one that an old man who is driving a wagon with a retinue of slaves comes. The place where three roads meet also symbolizes the choice that different road leads to different result. It is not the god forces Oedipus to make a choice but he himself because human beings have free will to make a choice.
Third, he kills the old man at the age of his father, and marries the woman at the age of his mother. And before he marries Jocasta, he doesn’t make clear the death of the old king. If he gets the oracle’s prediction in heart, he can actually avoid making such a choice. He is so confident that since he leaves his country he can escape from the prediction.
All these choices are the outcome of his free will, the reflection of his free will and character. Oedipus is so hubris that he over-believes his choices are right regardless of finding out the reasons. According to the theory of free will, and the relation of free will and man’s character and fate, a person’s character affects his choice, and the choice determines his fate. In this view, the Oedipus’s tragedy is the tragedy of free will which was determined by his character rather than God.
4. Conclusion
In many of the Greek tragedies, fate sets the stage. Some curse must be fulfilled. A doom impends and is inexorable. But the actors on the stage are far from puppets. Within the framework of the inevitable the tragic hero works out his own destiny, making the choices from which his personal catastrophe ensues.However, Oedipus doomed to kill his father and marry his mother is not fated to inquire into his past and to discover the sins. Therefore, it is not the fate determines the tragedy but the human being’s free will shapes the tragedy. And Oedipus’s tragedy is the tragedy of free will which is affected by his character.
Works Cited
[1] David Pratt. Fate or Free Will [M].Theosophical University Press Agency, 1997. .
[2] Maher, Michael. “Free Will.” The Catholic Encyclopedia（Vol. 6）[M].New York: Robert Appleton Company,1909.
[3]杜慧颖.论俄狄浦斯走向毁灭的原因[J].重庆科技学院学报（社会科学版）， 2008(4)：122，124.
[4]傅守祥.俄狄浦斯王：命运主题与悲剧精神的现代性[J].世界文学评论，2006(1).
[5]高岩.罪恶还是清白——俄狄浦斯王悲剧成因之我见[J].锦州师范学院学报（哲学社会科学版），2002(6).
[6]孟德群.俄狄浦斯的错误及其人生启示意义[J].名作欣赏，2005(12).