A son was born to Laius, king of Thebes, and on a day for rejoicing the king’s face was set hard. It was because of something an oracle had told him long before.
“This child will grow up and kill his father.” The king had the baby’s ankles tied and had him left on a mountain, believing he had cut the prophecy off with his own hands.
The Baby Handed On Twice
The herdsman given the errand could not kill the baby, and passed the child to a herdsman from the country over the mountain. The baby went to Polybus, king of Corinth.
The king and queen had no children and raised the baby as their son. The ankles that had been tied were swollen, so they called him Oedipus, which means swollen foot.
Oedipus grew up believing he was the king’s own son, and one day at a feast somebody let something slip in drink. “You are a foundling.”
The Road Taken to Escape the Oracle
Oedipus went to Delphi and asked, but the oracle said nothing about his birth and said something else. “You will kill your father and marry your mother.”
He decided not to go back to Corinth, and it was a choice made to protect Polybus, whom he took for his father. And that road was the road to Thebes.
Where three roads met he came upon a carriage. Get out of the way. I will not. It turned into a quarrel. Oedipus struck the old man in the carriage and killed him.
That old man was Laius. It happened on a road taken to get away from his father, and neither of them knew the other.
The Riddle of the Sphinx
Thebes at that time was being tormented by a monster, the Sphinx, with the body of a lion and the face of a woman. It sat on a rock and set a riddle to everybody who passed.
“What has four legs in the morning, two at noon and three in the evening?” Those who could not answer were eaten on the spot, and nobody answered.
Oedipus stood in front of the rock. “A human being. It crawls, then it walks, then it leans on a stick.” The Sphinx threw itself down off the rock.
The Stranger Who Became King
Thebes took the stranger who saved the city as its king, and the empty place beside the queen came with it. Queen Jocasta had just lost her husband.
The two married and children were born. Oedipus was a good king, and Thebes was at peace for a while.
He did not know. Who the old man he killed where three roads met had been. Who the person beside him was.
The Truth a Plague Dug Up
Some years later a plague went through Thebes, and the oracle said, “Find the man who killed Laius and drive him out.”
Oedipus set about hunting for the culprit, and being a good king he dug all the way down. In fact he was digging down towards himself.
A blind prophet held his words back and finally let them out. “The man you are looking for is you.” An old herdsman was called in and the pieces fitted together one by one.
A baby left on a mountain. Swollen ankles. The old man where three roads met. All of it was one person’s story.
Jocasta took her own life, and Oedipus put out his own eyes. Then he laid down the crown and left Thebes.
Today, the Road That Comes Closer the More You Avoid It
Laius cast out his son to escape a prophecy, and it was the same step as Cronus swallowing his children (chapter 3). The hand that meant to avoid it became the hand that set it going.
The cast out son did not know his father’s face, and because he did not know he struck at the place where three roads met. Had he known, it is a thing he would never have done.
Oedipus too left home to escape a prophecy, and because he left he set out on the road to Thebes. The step taken to avoid it carried him straight there.
He solved other people’s riddles in one stroke, but the riddle of himself he solved last of all. Knowing and knowing yourself were two different things.
Only once his eyes were shut did he see everything there was to see, and beside him his daughter Antigone stayed and became his guide. The story of that daughter is the next chapter.