Morality And Morality In Oedipus

Oedipus is one of the first Western tragedies written by Sophocles who is known for his plays. This play based around Greek Mythology became popular in the Greek world and motivated other scholars in the 20th century, (Encyclopedia Britannica 1). E.R. Dodds was one of those motivated 20th century scholars who wrote On Misunderstanding the Oedipus Rex that proclaims his subjective point of view. Dodds expresses that in Oedipus, Oedipus the King should not be held accountable for killing his father and marrying his mother because he is morally innocent, and did not take into account what he truly did until the very end which ended up determining his fate. He also refutes the idea that the gods determined his fate for him because of his actions. However, another 20th century scholar by the name of P. H. Vellacott also wrote a subjective literary analysis on Oedipus called The Guilt of Oedipus that Vellacott declares that in the story of the House of Atreus, men and women commit actions that are carried out under God’s eyes and the cause and effect of those actions were an important significance to morality. Oedipus neglects this important significance of morality. Vellacott strongly claimed that there was no morality significance or religious content in the story, only “[uncomprehended] resignation,” (Vellacott 138). He argues that Oedipus is guilty because he does not know how a man like him could fail to reason like Vellacott had himself. Both scholars interpret and use the