Gender: The Position of Women
Sophocles Antigone being a woman in ancient Greek, had a role that was supposed to make her conduct herself according to the customs and traditions at the time. The position of the women from the Greek ancient times was always lowest compared to that of men. For the Greek women, freedom was limited as there were a set of rules that were to be followed, and these laws dictated the behavior of women in society. This, however, was not the case when a particular event of her brother’s death caused her of tempting to break the norm, where women were only supposed to raise children and in particular male children who would act as the heir to the family. Antigone takes a strong stand for good to challenge the social values and laws that made women appear like inferior beings who should merely take instructions. Living in such a confined society, Antigone stands out to go against the social norms that belittle women and in what is viewed as a rebellion, against what the society has set and comes out to bury her brother against the will of the society and the king.
Creon, the King of Thebes, represented all Men who on the other hand, believed that the role of men is to rule over anything and everything, however, the women are supposed to submit and be extremely passive to whatever the man or men have decided. The society made women seem not strong to oppose men, that even women themselves were threatened by the culture, as it is seen in Ismene when she tries to talk out Antigone by showing how mighty the men are as opposed to women. He sees women as weak and unable to defeat him in anything. This kind of mindset held by Creon depicts gender bias from the modern feminist point of view.
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Ethically and morally, burials of human beings are supposed to be done properly; nevertheless, the person was considered bad for society. This is because the person being buried has relatives who would feel agonized by the event not taking place, as Antigone was experiencing the emotional reaction of how her brother was denied a proper burial since King Creon considered him a traitor in the City of Thebes. Farneth (2013) argues that the individual decision to follow human law or the divine law can give rise to the conflict. For the ancient Greek, nature dictates how the law is to be applied to every person based on their gender, and therefore the ethical consciousness, whether male or female, takes the human law or the divine law.
The action and words said by the King were taken as an automatic law that no man or woman could go against without dire consequences of extreme nature such as execution or even being exiled. If any person were to go against the King and what he said, the society believed it would be a man but never a woman since they were considered too weak to oppose any decision the men made, especially King Creon. The issue of concern in the play arises when one person stands for the state and human law while the other person stands for individual consciousness and divine law that seeks to promote fairness and equality for both genders ( Farneth, 2013 ). While King Creon is a strong believer in obedience to the laws of the land, and this determines his view of what is morally right, Antigone stands with her consciousness of what is the right thing to be done and with the divine law.
GENDER CONFLICT
Individual consciousness vs. State Control
The conflict arises when Antigone has been denied burial of her brother by the king however she decides to do the opposite of what is required from a woman, which is that she has decided that she will go against the King. In the reasons for doing the right thing for her and her family by trying to bury her brother in a proper way to honor life, he lived before his death. The determination of who has acted ethically between Creon and Antigone is determined by the conflict of one believing in individual consciousness and the other on the adherence to the state laws. As an individual, Antigone is morally obliged to give his brother a proper burial like was done to the other men. However, according to the state laws and norms, a woman is not allowed to engage in the burial as this violates the norms of the society. Her self-consciousness and belief in the divine laws tell her that any human being deserves a decent burial, and she believes nothing is wrong with that act. In contrast, King Creon is determined to protect human law and keep order by restricting the role of women in society. Both the two characters in the conflict seems to prove the ethical point of their actions. However, in the Hegel’s view, “the religious and political communities that tend to justify their beliefs and actions through an appeal to the natural or the given are subject to tragic conflict and eventually fall” (Farneth, 2013). The conflict between Creon and Antigone are tragic because of the inherent obligations which have been made natural and rarely change despite the changes in the aspects of the community over time.
The love and loyalty for Polyneices lead Antigone to go against the social roles that bound her directly and therefore makes Antigone an active figure in the situation where her values make her to be willing to break the law that involves her family so as for them to be contended from doing the right thing. Ismene is a static figure who knows the problem but is not willing to act due to fear of reasonable consequences that might come to her life if she mourns for her brother or attempts to. Antigone finds herself in a gendered conflict because of the love for his brother, whom she feels deserves a good burial as opposed to what the king wants. A decision to follow either human law or divine law leads to a one side conflict which can be irreconcilable ( Farneth, 2013 ).
Divine Laws vs. Human Laws
While the divine law can be based on the use of individual consciousness, human law relies on the use of norms which have been naturalized and used from time to time without undergoing any change or scrutiny. In this case, the conflict arises from the two may never be resolved, and such a community is bound for a collapse or rise of civil unrest. Antione and Creon both feel that they are obliged to obey the divine law and human law respectively, and while everyone tries to fulfill their roles, it results in some feeling of authoritative to both characters ( Farneth, 2013 ). Creon feels that women must adhere to the state laws, and Antigone’s rebellion to him is an act of defiance and disrespect that cannot be tolerated from a woman. Antigone, on the other hand, sees the moral obligation to bury her brother properly, and restriction from the king only makes her feel the oppression of women and the need to move away from such unethical acts.
King Creon is as well determined to prove himself to the society that women are not supposed to defy the laws of men because if women were to succeed in defeating men both socially and in leadership, the men would be considered less or worse than the women they rule over. When later on Haimon, the son of Creon, was expected to get married to Antigone; the King did not approve his son of marrying her since he knew how she had a different view of what was expected from her. Antigone confesses that her defiance against the laws of the King came as a result of having only one specific family that she cannot replace. This made her go against every role that was aligned for her as a woman.
The theme of state control arises when Antigone feels that individuals have the rights to reject society’s infringement on personal freedom and obligations. To the extent of disobeying the human-made laws, Antigone feels that state laws are not absolute and can be broken when justified under moral consciousness to do what is right. The opposition between the two characters comes as a result of a collision between the obligations; each side sees the other as morally wrong. This then holds “that consciousness which belongs to the divine law sees in the other side only the violence of human caprice, while that which holds to human law sees in the other only the self-will and disobedience of the individual who insists on being his authority” (Farneth, 2013). Further, gender conflict is escalated by the fact that there is a contradiction in the differential gendered roles in ancient Greek. Antigone only fulfills his obligation to the divine law by burying her brother, but at the same time, she rebels the human laws against his role in society. The two laws are contradicting, and fulfilling one law only violates the other and creates a scenario that increases the conflict between the two characters.
By burying his brother, Antigone violates the human law and is therefore subject to consequences, which are, however, in the objective form rather than subjective guilt. Her guilt seems more inexcusable, but the reliance on moral consciousness makes her crime excusable. On the other hand, Creon goes against the divine law, and while his guilt seems excusable for the defense that he protects the state laws, his crime seems inexcusable ( Farneth, 2013 ). As stated, ethics is sometimes open to moral consciousness, and the human laws that have been naturalized and used over time without scrutiny may in some circumstances not represent ethics especially when it contradicts with the divine law, humanity and moral consciousness.
Hegel criticizes the natural allocation of the two laws to the two sexes as the foundation of the conflict between the two characters. Both the divine and human laws of the ancient Greek becomes meaningful through the social practices of a given period. In contrary, the Greek never too this into consideration but instead took these two laws associated with gender as being fixed, unrevisable, and given. Due to this rigidity in the laws over time, Antigone never saw her conflict with Creon as an ongoing revision of the law, a view that was also never seen by Creon. This led to a tragedy of the ethical given that created unresolved conflict between the two characters.
Reference
Farneth, M. (2013). Gender and the ethical given: human and divine law in Hegel’s reading of the Antigone. Journal of Religious Ethics, 41(4), 643–667
