Arrogance In Oedipus The King

Those who breath with absolute ego are subject to the worst sins of all. Indeed, the Greeks believed that one of the greatest flaw a man can ever live with was hubris, extreme pride and arrogance which ultimately led to actions of self-harm. It is just intriguing how much emphasis is produced on the convention of hubris to convey the theme of pride and anger leading to suffering and even destruction in this two famous Greek literature, Homer’s The Iliad and Sophocles’ Oedipus the King. In many ways, the excessive pride of certain characters in both literature incites and triggers their own downfall and ruin, which express the author’s huge awareness to the theme.

In Sophocles’ Oedipus the King, Oedipus’s suffering due to his excessive pride

Jocasta displays hubris when she claim that she managed to deceive the gods with the act of murdering her son to avoid the bloodshed of her husband and marriage of her and their son and therefore gives no credence to anything the gods or oracles have to say, concluding with “human beings have no part in the craft of prophecy.” (815-832) With the hubris Jocasta expressed, the audience are familiar that she did the very thing that she was certain could never happen, marrying her son, Oedipus. When this relationship becomes known as the story reveals its dark secrets, she becomes ashamed and eventually commits suicide; therefore, it suggests that her pride caused her fall. In addition, Hector in Homer’s The Iliad, shows his arrogant and stubborn pride when it leads him to refuse to retreat when Achilles returns to battle and thus to allow a large number of his men to be massacred, declaring, “Are you not tired of being confined within walls? If Achilles enters the battle, I will fight him face to face, and one of us will win great glory!”(Chapter 6) However, after realizing what he has brought about, he later laments, refusing to withdraw, feeling that his pride led to the deaths of the men whom he didn’t allow to retreat earlier. This shows great esteem, even realizing what his pride have done to his men, this triggers a larger pride, feeling that they owe their lives to the comrades and ultimately drives him to battle and even bring him to his own