Differences And Similarities Between Antigone And Creon

In the play called Antigone which was written by Sophocles, the two characters of the play, Antigone and Creon, both stand in clear opposition to one another. In the play one of the men named Polyneices, the nephew of Creon and the brother of Antigone has been declared a traitor of Thebes and will be left dead on the battlefield with no burial. Antigone would much rather die than to let her brother be without a proper burial, but Creon believes that civil law is absolute. King Creon believes that Antigone’s brother should be considered a traitor and should be punished accordingly. He states that, “Polyneices, who broke his exile to come back with fire and sword against his native city and the shrines of his father’s gods . . . is to have no burial” (Sophocles, Antigone). When Creon first became king, he had to

Antigone uses ethics to defend her arguments while Creon uses logic. Creon’s arguments only rest on his idea that the king should be followed and obeyed even if they’re right or wrong. Both Creon and Antigone’s arguments seem to be coming down to ethics versus logic. A logical argument is typically stronger because of the facts, but the law which became fact, due to Creon was only his values so it turns out to be an argument between two people’s values. In the play, Antigone, Creon and Antigone cannot give in to each other and if Creon gave in to Antigone’s wishes and spared her brother, he would have felt that he weakened himself as a ruler in the eyes of the people he ruled over while Antigone felt that he had to break Creon’s law for the honor that her already dishonored family had for being incestuous. All Antigone wanted was for her family to have an honorable death. Even with Creon’s wants, he eventually gave into Antigone’s desires and gave her brother a