Oidipous’s identification of the shepherd consumes five and a half lines, far more than necessary. Indeed, there is no need for him to make this identification at all, for were he to say nothing at this point, the old man would in any case arrive and be identified. Oidipous’s comments appear to the audience to serve no purpose other than for him to make a self-conscious display of his acumen, which culminates in his emphasizing the fact that he has never before “had dealings” with the man: μὴ συναλλάξαντά πω. The audience knows, however, and even he should know from the accounts that make this man a participant in events of utmost significance to him, that he has in some sense twice before had dealings with him. The word he uses here for “dealings” was heard once before at the play’s opening, when the priest used it to attribute to Oidipous special success in interactions with the gods (δαιμόνων συναλλαγαῖς; l. 34). Thus, Oidipous’s present claim suggests that a mortal may well see without being aware of what he is seeing; he in fact requires divine assistance to interpret the evidence of his own senses correctly. So instead of attributing to Oidipous a special facility for understanding and responding appropriately to the will of the gods, the audience has begun to see that the reverse is true; Oidipous is peculiarly obtuse when it comes to recognizing the signs of divine intervention. His present misstatement in regard to the herdsman can of course be excused on the grounds that as a baby he could neither recognize nor be expected to remember the man who briefly handled him, and at their second encounter he did not see the one man who escaped death by ducking out of sight. The audience, on the other hand, has been learning to make a new inference: events that are extremely unlikely to occur by chance can be arranged to occur by the god, and so whenever the highly improbable does occur, one should suppose that the god had a hand in it. The identity of rescuing shepherd and sole survivior is precisely such a case. Yet the man who solved the Sphinx’s riddle misses the point that he has encountered this singularly significant man in three phases of his life: when he was an infant (going on three limbs), when he had just entered manhood as he fled Delphi and was using a cane or traveler’s walking stick (and so again going on three), and now, with age advancing upon him, perhaps leaning on a cane or staff of office. Once again, then, the audience is invited to observe the discrepancy between the inconsequential, even obstructive, gains that Oidipous’s powers of reason enable him to make and the very consequential facts that elude his notice even when they have been laid out before him by prophets and mortal witnesses. He appears to be capable of seeing and understanding only what he is emotionally disposed to see and understand, and this does not include divine intervention. [Mpei] [Md] [P] [Mi]