Sophocles’ Oedipus Plays:
Tyranny, Atheism, and the Limits to Enlightenment

A Discussion Seminar

Are you really rational,
or only brilliantly self-deceiving?

“To understand is so terrible, where it does not profit the knower.” —Teiresias, Oedipus Tyrannus

Join us at AAI this Fall for a seminar on Sophocles’ Oedipus plays.

Starting September 17th, we will meet for 6 weeks every Tuesday from 7 pm to 8:30pm at the Abigail Adams Institute at 14 Arrow St, Ste G10 in Cambridge.

There is no cost to the program, and each week's readings will be provided to all participants.

The translation we are using is Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannus and Oedipus at Colonus, in The Theban Plays, translated by Peter J. Ahrensdorf and Thomas L. Pangle. Agora Editions, Cornell Univ Press: 2014.

Refreshments will be provided at each session.

Open to Undergraduates and graduate Students
At Harvard and boston area universities

Oedipus rises up as the hero who saves us by solving the Sphinx's riddle. Through him, Sophocles poses to us a riddle of his own: Are there riddles that are best left unsolved? Are there truths we could not face? Are truly enlightened, rational, or "demystified" societies even possible, let alone desirable? Oedipus becomes tyrant of a foreign city by his own wits, boasting of solving mysteries with his intellect that the priests and oracles could not. But he stabs out his eyes at discovering his (unwitting) incest with his mother and murder of his father, core taboos across societies that elicit an anger or disgust that goes beyond rational or human calculation, a pollution that god himself must abhor. Was Oedipus' attempt to rule "rationally" -- as tyrant and apart from law and piety -- part of a hubris that necessarily blinds him? Would his rationalism weaken the reverence and awe, including the taboos, a healthy society needs to remain moderate and free? Or is Oedipus' flaw instead that he is only superficially rational, and unable to face head on his need of transcendence or salvation? Is his hubris rather intoxication with god? Nearing death, he changes into a prophet dear to the gods and an instrument of divine vengeance against his enemies, even his own sons. Has he become wise through his extreme suffering, or ever more deluded? Though Theseus, the king and founder of Athens, criticizes this savage anger, he gives refuge to Oedipus against an invasion force and then uses him as proof of divine blessing for Athens, concealing the mystery of his death as a miracle. Is Theseus' "mysticism" instead the truly enlightened approach--is he the riddle-solver? Or does Sophocles pose a riddle without an answer?

Discussion will be led by Manuel Lopez, who taught political philosophy at the University of Chicago after receiving his undergraduate and law degrees from Harvard. His academic research has centered on Plato and his understanding of the relation between justice and eros. He currently serves as a senior fellow at the Abigail Adams Institute.