Oedipus is an excellent ruler of Thebes. He is a king, a great father, and has the respect of all the Thebans. Oedipus, however, has a lot of problems. He marries his mom, kills his dad, all the gods hate him, he is impetuous, and he is blind to the world, but it all boils down to one colossal flaw: his feet. I bet you are wondering what Oedipus fatal flaw has to deal with his feet. Well ,it is quite simple, they are swollen. When Oedipus was an infant, his parents did not exactly want this little fellow, so they tried to get rid of him.
Oedipus parents had his feet staked to a hillside so he would pass on to a better and more wonderful world. It did not work. Far away on another grassy knoll, a lonely sheered watching over his flock of sheep spied the babe and took pity on the poor little tyke. He took Oedipus in his burly arms and brought him to his wife in a cottage near the crossroads. There they will decide what to do with the newborn. As the shepherds wife was trying to mend the swollen feet of Oedipus, the shepherd remembered why the king and queen of Thebes were trying to do away with this little neonate.
The God Apollo, had a made a disturbing prophesy, that the first born son to the royal family of Thebes, would indeed marry his mother and kill his father. So the shepherd knew that some how, some way, he must get this bantling far, far away from Thebes. Just out of the blue, a Corinthian messenger strolls by. The shepherd gets a brilliant idea, if I give this little pipsqueak to this guy, then hell take the baby far, far away and the prophesy will never come true. The Corinthian messenger gladly took the child away and presented it to his king and queen.
As a young man growing up in Corinth, he was teased a lot on how he would walk around the city. His feet never recovered completely so for the rest of his life he walked with a limp wherever he would go. He was the Rudolph of his village. He was a pariah. The other children never let him play in the Reindeer games. So Oedipus was forced to spend most of his time learning what his father was doing to run the kingdom and Oedipus particularly liked when his tutor would give him riddles to solve. Oedipus became a very smart man at a very young age.
Even though he couldnt run to save his life, he could multiply seven digit numbers in his head with pinpoint accuracy. The king wanted to tell Oedipus that he was not his father and that he was stranded by his real ones, but the king loved him too much, so he kept it a secret. Apollo, the god of light, hates Oedipus. He is not the only one to do hate him. To be frank, all the gods hate Oedipus. The reason they hate him is because he is a gimp. He has swollen feet. The gods looking down from above laugh as Oedipus tries to gimp his way along. They all get a kick out of him whenever he falls down on the ground.
Sometimes the god of wind will help out by blowing just enough wind in the wrong direction to push Oedipus down. Since the gods determine a mans kismet, they all got together and made a pact to make Oedipus life as hard and as tragic as it could possibly be. When Apollo fated Oedipus to marry his mother and to kill his father, Apollo was just thinking of the worst possible ordeals for Oedipus to go through. When Oedipus was a boy, he had to prove to all the others that we were strong and not a cripple. In one characteristic of a strong man in these times was a man who could act quickly and effectively.
This usually led to impulsive or impetuous actions. Oedipus was no exception; he would act without thinking thing through. He would say the first thing that struck his fancy. When he called down all the curses on the murderer and even more curses on the murderer if they lived in his home. Another example of Oedipus impulsive streak reared its ugly head when he met his real father on the Crossroads. Oedipus heard about this dreadful prophecy so he ran away from home to Thebes. On the way he reached the crossroads, and encountered a man (Laius).
This man said something to his compatriots, that Oedipus could not hear, and all the men traveling in a horse-drawn wagon, started to laugh. The man walked up to Oedipus and forcefully tried to push Oedipus off the road, so Oedipus punched the man. This guy did not like it too much, so he tried to hit Oedipus with a two-pronged goad. So the only thing Oedipus could do was to kill the man and all of his companions. Again he was trying to prove that he was strong and not some little week cripple that could be pushed around. Unbeknownst to Oedipus he had fulfilled moiety of Apollos curse.
When Oedipus reached the city of Thebes, he solves the riddle of the sphinx. The towns people loved Oedipus and wanted him to be king of Thebes. The only way he could do that was to marry the beautiful queen. Thus, Apollos prophecy was sealed. Oedipus had killed his father and married his mother. So, the poor guy was hated by the gods, hated by his hometown, he married his mom, killed his dad, and he jumped to conclusions. You might be asking what these all had to do with Oedipus swollen feet. It is all quite simple: The gods hated him because he walked like a retard, and he was easy to make fun of.
All his peers looked down upon him because with his swollen feet he could not be a role model in the Olympics. He married his mom because he solved the riddle of the sphinx; he would have never been able to solve the riddle if he could have played with the children instead of studying riddles. He killed his dad because his dad made fun of the way he walked. The reason why he was impetuous was that he thought that strong men reacted quickly in any situation. So basically his swollen feet was the most fatal flaw of all, because it caused all the rest.
