Jocasta explains the attempted murder, "As for the child I bore him, not three days passed before he yoked the ball-joints of its feet, then cast it, by other's hands, on a trackless mountain" (OR 722-724).
While Oedipus is an infant, the last incident that shows how uncontrollable fate can be is the servant's decision not to kill Oedipus. The servant takes Oedipus to the mountains, but he is not able to leave him alone to die. Instead, the servant gives the child to a shepherd to take to a far away land where no one knows who he is. Oedipus asks the servant, "Then why did you give him up to this old man?" The servant then replies,.
In pity, master - so he would take him home, .
to another land. But what he did was save him.
for this supreme disaster. If you are the one .
he speaks of - know your evil birth and fate! (OR 1182-1186).
The power of fate is further emphasized as Oedipus is able to escape his ordered death, and he begins his controlled life in a world where he can still kill his father and marry his mother.
When Oedipus becomes a young man, many other events occur showing humans cannot control their fate. Oedipus grew up in Corinth with King Polybus and Queen Merope. At a feast, a drunken man tells Oedipus that Polybus is not his real father. Oedipus tells Jocasta, "This: at a feast a man who"d drunk too much denied, at the wine, I was my father's son" (OR 783-784). Oedipus is quite disturbed by this bit of news and wants to find the truth. When he questions his mother and father, they become enraged at the man who told Oedipus the lie. He is immediately cheered up by their comfort (OR). .
Oedipus's next action also demonstrates how humans cannot control fate. In doubts as to his origin, Oedipus too questioned the oracle and was warned to avoid his home since he was destined to murder his father and take his mother in marriage (Freud 102). When Oedipus hears his terrible fate he tries to avoid it by running away.
