No matter what anyone tries, no matter what
anyone does, no matter what anyone believes they have accomplished, they have
not controlled fate. Fate is
uncontrollable. Much like betting on a
³sure thing² and knowing in the back of your mind that there are infinite
factors in the outcome--anything could happen.
It¹s unfortunate that the people of Ancient Greece sanctioned the
concept of fate. In the Era of
Enlightenment the idea of God-controlled fate was finally challenged with the
notion of self-fulfilled destiny; until then, men turned to prophets and
oracles. In the play Oedipus, by
Sophocles, there was a ongoing synergy between fate and knowledge that was constantly
rejected. Oedipus, the main character,
struggled to dominate his own destiny, but ironically fell back into his
bizarre misfortune that was in the end, inevitable.
Misfortune, false realities, deception: all a
result of Oedipus knowing too much and at the same time too little of his true
lot in life. Knowledge was what nurtured
him into false pretenses. Knowledge
was a false pretense. By knowing that his parents were out of harms
way, namely his, he knew that his prophecy would not come true. He knew that as long as his father was still
alive and he was married to a woman not even related to his mother, he would
not bear the offspring that ³men would shudder to look upon.² It was the epitome of irony for Oedipus to
know his fate, and try to avoid it with the ³knowledge² that he had
obtained:
³My father was
Polybus of Corinth, my mother the Dorian Merope, and I was held the foremost
man in all that town until a thing happened--a thing to startle a man, though
not to make him angry as it made me. We
were sitting at the table, and a man who had drunk too much cried out that I
was not my father¹s son--and I, though angry, restrained my anger for that day;
but the next day went to my father and my mother and questioned them. They were indignant at the taunt and that
comforted me--and yet the man¹s words rankled...I sought where I might escape
those infamous things--the doom that was laid upon me.²
When Oedipus fled from his parents, he started
the chain reaction of ironic happenstance that would eventually direct him in a
complete circle back into the same position he was when he left Corinth. The destiny of doom that Oedipus was
attempting to avoid, was the destiny that he was inadvertently fulfilling. Fate is defined as a destined outcome;
nothing can alter that no matter what is tried.
Anyway, this time it was too late for Oedipus to do anything about it,
for the infinite factors that contributed to his demise were irreversible and
dormant until the very ironically tragic end.
Oedipus tried to master fate and it ultimately mastered him.
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