NASLEĐE EDIPOVE SFINGE: UDES SAMOIDENTIFIKOVANjA

Abstract

The paper seeks to signalize the history of human self-understanding through the changes that the mythical encounter between Oedipus and the Sphinx underwent. First, a pattern is detected according to which the modern in Oedipus recognizes and celebrates the triumph of man over nature and his corresponding elevation into a sovereign subject. The central part of the paper offers an overview of contemporary (re)interpretations that restore the right to the Sphinx and suggest the desirability or necessity of a “new mythology”. The central part of the paper offers an overview of those contemporary (re)interpretations that restore the right of the Sphinx and suggests the desirability or necessity of a “new mythology”. The finding is that Oedipus, in a compulsive endeavor to completely disenchant the world, banished every secret and ecstasy from it, so the time has come for its “re-enchantment”. The final part of the paper tests and recommends a third strategy: the Enlightenment’s demythologization of the Enlight- enment as the last myth, revealing that Oedipus is the secret of the Sphinx, his construct. That is why it is his responsibility for insecurity into his own identity and status in the world not to move narcissistically onto projections of everything different from himself that he has subju- gated or will subjugate, but, for the sake of both himself and the world, less intimidated, more peacefully and in solidarity approach to it.