Rethinking Oedipus

I was thinking about Sophocles' play again. Oedipus Rex if you didn't catch it the first time.

Previously I had the idea that Sophocles may have been giving too much power to the gods, but I've changed my stance. That is just reading into things. Actually, the strange fact about the story is that had the parents never pursued a prophecy to begin with, then none of the story would have ever happened. Oedipus would not have been abandoned by Iocaste, because there wouldn't have been a prophecy to fear. This could almost be interpreted as a warning against prophecy.

I like to keep my options open though, because really I don't believe that a good story's lessons can be simplified. The lessons are the story itself, the experience of the story. If the author just wanted to write a fortune cookie then I'm sure that's what they would have done, but instead he or she decided to write a story.