The quantity of grief the Thebans are about to experience depends upon their continued “care” for the ruling family, but double entendre is discernible in ἐντρέπεσθε, which might describe a feeling of “reverence” inappropriate to direct towards the ruling family. [Gd] The Athenian audience can therefore interpret the terrible “works” or “deeds” that have just occurred within the palace as the consequence of rulers being reverenced by their citizens. [Gt-a] [P] A city must distinguish between the faith it may appropriately place in its rulers and that which it should only place in its gods. While Thebes and Athens both honor their gods with rites and rituals, neither city expects or perhaps even wants its gods actively to manage its wellbeing. Thus the prediction of terrible things yet to be revealed and grief to be endured has the ring of prophecy, this time however, with the implicit understanding that the calamity’s cause lies in the city’s holding its rulers higher than it holds its gods. If this aspect of prophecy yields insight into the prophecies given Oidipous and Athens, what appears to be a prediction can and should in fact be taken as instruction; there is something to be done. If it is unclear what action the god requires in order to remove or mitigate the threatened consequences, it is up to the Athenian audience to inquire further of Delphi, what that is. [Mip]