Abstract

ZAIDAN, Eduardo. Pride and punishment. Ide (São Paulo) [online]. 2025, vol.47, n.79, pp.139-152.  Epub July 11, 2025. ISSN 0101-3106.  https://doi.org/10.5935/0101-3106.v47n79.13.

This article revisits three canons of Western civilization - the Bible, the Odyssey and Oedipus the King - to advance Bion’s hypotheses about the central crime of Sophocles’ play Oedipus the King; not incest, as Freud had argued, but arrogance. These three works reveal a common theme: a critique of hýbris, pride. Sexuality takes center stage in the popular mindset, because admitting man’s limitations hurts humanity’s self-love. Psychoanalysis is not a science of mastery; like Oedipus, it recognizes the limit inherent in the possibility of knowing, which makes humans ignorant par excellence.

Keywords : Freudian Metapsychology; Bible; Odyssey; Oedipus the King.

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