"Antigone" is a play by the ancient Greek tragedian Sophocles, written in 442 BC, and is widely recognized as one of the greatest works in the history of drama. The story unfolds in Thebes, where Creon takes the throne as the new king, succeeding Oedipus. Oedipus' son Eteocles sacrifices himself to protect the city, while his other son, Polynices, betrays the city by conspiring with foreign forces to attack Thebes and dies in battle. After the war, Creon arranges a grand funeral for Eteocles but leaves Polynices' corpse to rot in the field. Creon issues a decree that anyone who buries Polynices will be sentenced to death. Polynices' sister, Antigone, defies Creon's order and buries her brother, citing adherence to divine law as her justification. Consequently, she is sentenced to death by Creon. Meanwhile, Creon encounters a blind prophet, Tiresias, who tells him that he has offended the gods. Creon regrets his decision and rushes to save Antigone, but she has already died. Creon's son Haemon, who is also Antigone's fiancé, confronts Creon and then commits suicide. Creon's wife, Eurydice, upon hearing of her son's death, blames Creon and takes her own life. At this point, Creon realizes he has single-handedly caused the tragedy.
"Antigone" is a classic of ancient Greek tragedy, and its metaphorical significance has been subject to various interpretations. In the play, Antigone, while defying Creon, utters a passage that legal scholars often cite: "The unwritten, unspoken laws of the gods are eternal. They were not just for now or yesterday, but exist forever, and no one knows when they first appeared." "I do not believe that your edicts have such power that you, a mere mortal, can override the unwritten and eternal laws of the gods. They are not of today or yesterday, but they exist forever, and no one knows their origin in time!" This passage has become a classic in the debate between natural law theory and legal positivism.
In the Western context, Antigone's defiance of city-state law is referred to as "Antigone's complaint," and this tragic resentment has become one of the sources of constitutionalism, democracy, and the rule of law. In political science and jurisprudence, Antigone symbolizes the attitude and spirit of using higher law to criticize the state's positive law. Today, our interpretations of this conflict extend beyond that, including perspectives from state law and customary law, from the standpoint of love and justice/law, and interpretations of humanitarianism and positive law. Hegel confines Antigone to the realm of family ethics and does not elevate her to the level of opposing unjust laws. The tragedians did not emphasize the tension and opposition between natural law and state law; they insisted that no one has a monopoly on virtue. For instance, Antigone's sister Ismene accuses her actions of being pretentious: "You do not love our brother; you love your own righteous stance. You want to win immortality with your stance. Your actions do not arise out of sympathy for specific life but from a fanatical passion for abstract principles." Nevertheless, Antigone, as a symbol, represents citizens standing up against unjust laws based on principles of natural law, divine law, and conscience.
This tragedy responded to the debates in Athens at the time about natural law. Heraclitus said, "All human laws are nourished by one law—the divine law." Pericles stated in his speech that failing to abide by this law would bring about universally recognized shame. Thus, the tragedy aligned with the worldview of ordinary Athenians at the time—piety towards the gods and obedience to divine will. In the end, Creon realized that one should never commit the sin of disrespecting the gods, as "mortals cannot escape the inevitable disasters." The principles expounded by the tragedy were first inherited and developed by Greek philosophers, and in the subsequent Hellenistic period, the Stoic school of thought further elaborated on it, formally establishing the tradition of natural law. Through developments by figures like Cicero, the position of natural law was formally recognized in Roman law. Since then, the tradition of natural law has continued to thrive and evolve. The significance of "Antigone" today lies in how it addresses the relationship between the law and citizens and how citizens should confront unjust laws.
Sophocles' "Antigone" inspired me to create a scene involving bones, salt, and burial. I prepared 200 kilograms of salt as a substitute for sand, along with 206 human skeletal pieces. I wore a white dress and laid out the white bones on the ground. Then, I scattered the salt by hand into the space. As I continued to spread the salt, the ground began to resemble freshly fallen snow, gradually covering the white bones. I bent down and used my body to push the bones and salt until they formed a white mound, symbolizing Antigone's act of burying her brother. Next, I slowly unfolded a piece of paper and poured out blue liquid from a water bottle. I continuously used my hands to collect the spreading blue water, as if gathering memories and grief related to the brother. Finally, I lay down on a white cloth and rolled from one end to the other. The white cloth enveloped my body, symbolizing Antigone's ultimate fate—death.
