What Oidipous means by “godless” is unclear. He cannot be blaming himself for a lack of belief in the gods because he has placed blame on Apollo for the suffering that he believes that god to have inflicted on him (ll. 1329-30). Nor can he mean “without a god’s interest or attention,” for he has just correctly identified Apollo as the god responsible for the events of his life, even including his self-inflicted blinding (ll. 1334-5). Oidipous seems to be complaining, rather, that he has had too much of a god’s enmity. It would make better sense if a-theos could mean “hated by a god,” but that would force upon the word a sense that it is not designed to carry. Thus, the problem introduced by the use of this word in this context cannot easily be resolved. Indeed, it only raises new questions: has Oidipous’s life been ruined by a dearth of divine love or by an excess of divine ire, by a fault in his own attitude towards Apollo or by a fault in Apollo’s attitude towards him? These questions give the audience impetus to engage in a search for better understanding of the relationship between Oidipous and Apollo, between any mortal and the sufferings to which his life may subject him.
The word a-theos having raised a multi-part question about the god’s regard for him launches the audience on an exploration that might start with its recollection that Oidipous earlier described how he felt about Apollo’s treatment of him when as a young man he went to Delphi to inquire about his parentage with the word a-timon (m789). Having the same alpha-privative structure as a-theos (prefixed to a word α means without), a-timon means “without honor.” On that occasion Oidipous did not say precisely how he was dishonored, but he has since then thrice recounted the god’s communication (ll. 789-93, 966-8, and 994-6) and, most curiously, he has at each recital worded the prophecy differently. The discrepancy among the three accounts has thus already confronted the audience with a problem to solve, and from the resulting process it has inferred that the god may not have been predicting Oidipous’s future but rather attempting to communicate to him the necessity that he actively participate in taking his father’s life. [Dnc] The audience would have understood that that killing was made necessary by the prophecies given Laios many years before his death, that if he should disobey the god by having intercourse with his wife, he must die at the hands of the child they conceived. [Apama] Once uttered, that threat made it necessary to the god that, if Laios disobeyed him, a child should be conceived, born, raised, and then somehow induced to kill his father. The god’s failure to realize the prophesied event would demonstrate his impotence and underscore for any mortal who knew about it the pointlessness of acting in accord with instructions from holy prophets and oracles. Oracles and prophets would lose their credibility, and the gods would lose a valuable medium for salubrious participation in mortal lives. That Oidipous has killed Laios proves the contrary: that Apollo’s power is sufficient to realize the prophetic statements issued in his name, even when the only acceptable mortal agent not only refuses his cooperation but actively resists the god’s efforts to obtain it. [Apamu] The audience will have found that what the oracle said to Oidipous was not only appropriate and accurate, but potentially helpful to him, because it presented him with the opportunity to comply with necessity willingly rather than requiring the god to force compliance upon him. Had Oidipous willingly drawn his father’s blood in accordance with a necessity to which Apollo was himself subject, that action would have been undertaken under the auspices of divine authority; it would have had the character of a holy sacrifice. [P] Had Oidipous grasped what was being communicated to him, it would have given him an entirely different view of Apollo and the relationship between them. Instead of cutting himself off from the god by fleeing Delphi and thereby making himself a-theos, he would have made himself Apollo’s willing agent, as he has been doing since being called called upon to address the plague ravaging his city. He would not, then, have had reason to complain of his treatment by Apollo [Aj] and he would not have reason to describe himself as a-theos.
Oidipous’s misunderstanding of the prophecy relating to his parents will have reminded the Athenian audience that responsibility for clarity falls to the mortal consulter. [Mipd] It was Oidipous’s duty neither to allow his feelings to be outraged [Md] nor to devise a plan of his own, especially one the aim of which was to prove the oracle wrong by demonstrating the god’s powerlessness to realize prophecies uttered in his name. It was Oidipous, then, who sought to dishonor the god, not the other way around. This insight may remind the audience of another attempt to dishonor prophecy, namely, Iokaste’s advocacy of the philosophical position adopted and cited by many Athenians [Gt/a], to the effect that the gods have no access to the domain of mortals [D], which means that prophecy is inauthentic. [Mpea] From that parallel the audience’s mind might have traveled back to the play’s opening moments, when Oidipous stepped forward in response to his people’s supplication of Apollo, god of plague, to come to them as their savior. Oidipous’s action in that instance appears to have been premised on the same belief upon which Iokaste’s later argument is based, namely: that since the gods cannot enter the mortal domain, it is pointless to seek their counsel or assistance. In reference to this attitude, Oidipous’s self-characterization as a-theos proves accurate; in rejecting and dishonoring the god he has closed out the opportunity for communication and cooperation between himself and Apollo [Mi]; he has thereby given the god no alternative but to force him, unwilling and unaware, to do what must be done.