The characters of Antigone and Creon in Antigone by Sophocles Antigone is the story of divine punishment and human imperfection. In this tragedy, a powerful king, Creon, is struck down by the Gods due to his contempt for their divine laws and true justice is ultimately shown to triumph. Creon makes the mistake of putting his personal opinions above divine laws and fails in the eyes of the Gods. He makes the mistake of testing the power of the gods and the remaining story is basically Creon's degeneration. After Antigone's "crime", Creon increasingly proves himself to be a lone warrior in his cause and his family and supporters begin to abandon him. As the tragedy progresses, Creon becomes more and more hostile and ultimately, with the destruction of his own family, he is rightly punished by the Gods. Antigone on the other hand, is shown as an instrument of Creon's destiny as it is her death that sets off a chain reaction to the former. Antigone has two brothers: - Eteocles and Polynices, both fighters for opposing factions in the Theban war. While Eteocles fights for the protection of Thebes, Polyneices fights to conquer it. At the end of the war and the beginning of the story it is shown that Thebes won but both brothers are dead. The story goes on to state that Polyneices has been condemned as a traitor by Creon (and the city's edicts) while Eteocles is hailed as a hero and martyr. The refusal of a brother's burial and his condemnation to a worse afterlife forces Antigone to sacrifice herself for him. Both the protagonist, Antigone, and the antagonist, Creon, are pushed towards...... middle of the paper......nd finally makes the former see the truth. Antigone, Haemon, and Eurydice are shown as the instruments of Creon's destruction. Their deaths send the final message of God's disapproval of Creon's actions and they die because of Creon's sins. In the end, Creon himself is forced to admit his guilt and, by his own decree, banishes himself from society. This is the only time in the play where Creon actually acts like a real king and not just with mere words. Thus, the king who banishes a woman for her "sins" is forced to make the same judgment on himself when he realizes her shortcomings. The final destruction of both characters is the culmination of their blind faith in their own morals and their insistence on making impulsive decisions in defense of their ideals. They are victims of their own errors of judgment.