Aside from being a piece of classic literature, a religious and mythological text, and a piece of Greek theater, Antigone is also a deeply political work concerned with the nature of justice, specifically within the Greek city-state. A topic concerning much of ancient Greek philosophy is the ways in which an ideal state ought to be organized in order to best ensure human flourishing and divine blessing. Many Greek philosophers posited an ideal city-state that is organized in a way that mirrors the cosmos themselves, with human interaction as the medium between the heavens and the crude matter of the world. In this regard, Sophocles was no different. Antigone was written, at least in part, to serve as an example of Zeus’s divine justice for the city-state; specifically, it offers an answer to the question of how the state may best achieve political authority within the confines of divine piety.

In order to engage with this question, Sophocles creates a conflict between Antigone, who represents the will of the gods, and Creon, who represents the state of Thebes. By virtue of being a traitor and a blood family member simultaneously, Polynices serves as a means of conflict between these two archetypes. Antigone adopts the unyielding perspective that Polynices must be buried as if he were one of their own, and Creon remains similarly unyielding in his position that Polynices is an enemy to the state and must be treated as such. Sophocles attempts to provide an answer for how Thebes ought to ensure justice in such a scenario by showing the self-destructive results of any immovable conflict between two perspectives upheld by Zeus.

Through the ensuing tragedy, the audience comes to understand that what both Antigone and Creon lack all along is respect for each other’s perspectives. Antigone, despite being pious, nonetheless defies a king, whose power is upheld by Zeus. Creon, conversely, is the justified ruler of Thebes, but he nonetheless defies the demands of the gods. Zeus’s true justice, therefore, must exist somewhere in the middle of these two perspectives. In this way, Thebes can become a place that upholds political law only insofar as the demands of piety allows, and is only as pious as due respect for the laws of the city-state allow. This is the nature of the justice that Sophocles hopes to show his audience.