1) In Euripides' play Medea, the characters Medea and Jason come face-to-face and argue about their situation. Medea feels betrayed by Jason marrying the king's daughter, while Jason feels he has done nothing wrong. 2) Medea uses pathos in her argument, recounting all she has sacrificed for Jason. Jason uses logos, claiming marrying the princess improves their lives. 3) Neither concedes, fueling Medea's vengeance and leading her to murder their children. Their rhetorical debate is a pivotal moment driving the plot.

1. Matthew Highnam
CLAS 1020
SP#3
Professor Christopher Ostro
2/27/14
Rhetorical Analysis of the Medea vs. Jason Argument in Euripides’ Medea
In Euripides’ Medea, the two characters who are the driving force of the play, Medea and
Jason, finally come face-to-face in lines 448-575. At this point of the play, both characters have
extremely different takes on the situation at hand between them. On one hand, Medea is
heartbroken and feels that Jason has betrayed her and their sons by marrying the King’s
daughter. On the other hand, Jason feels as though he has done nothing wrong and is only doing
what is best for his family’s well-being. Medea is full of anger, bitterness, and vengefulness
when this argument starts and Jason comes in, for the first time of the play, seeming, if anything
at all, frustrated with Medea for getting her and his sons exiled from Helias. Both of them
proceed to go make a long presentation of their argument and viewpoint of the situation to one
another. However, both of them conduct these in very different ways as Medea uses a pathos
approach and Jason uses a logos approach. Each of them appeals to the other, as well as the
audience, in their own way in an attempt to make the other concede, and this difference can be
made evident through comparing and contrasting both of their arguments.
First, Medea’s side of the argument can be dissected as she is the one who feels slighted
and presents the general basis of the problem in the play, which is Jason betraying her and their
sons by marrying the King’s daughter. After bashing Jason for a few lines Medea continues on to
discuss the core of her argument. She presents all of the things she has done and sacrificed just
for Jason’s sake. “I rescued you, as the Greeks who were your shipmates long ago aboard the

2. Argo, when you were sent to master the monstrous bulls with yokes and sow the furrow with
seeds of death. The serpent who never slept, his twisted coils protecting the golden fleece, I was
the one who killed it and held out to you a beacon of safety. I betrayed both my father and my
house and went with you to Pelias’ land, Iolkos, showing in that more eagerness than sense. I
murdered Pelias by the most painful of deaths, at the hands of his own daughters, and I destroyed
his whole house” (475-488). This excerpt from Medea’s argument to Jason shows her listing
everything she has done for Jason. Basically, she implies that she has given her all for him and
done whatever has been necessary to protect him no matter how terrible the deeds. After
displaying her devotedness, sacrifice, and loyalty to Jason, she highlights how he has now repaid
her--by forsaking their marriage and family for another woman. To follow this, she goes on to
describe how terrible her past actions have made her life now that he has betrayed her and their
family. “Now where should I go? To my father’s house? To my country which I betrayed to
come with you? To Pelias’ wretched daughters? Of course, they would welcome the slayer of
their father into their home! This is how things are: to my nearest and dearest I stand an enemy,
and those I shouldn’t have wronged are now my enemies because I did you a favor” (501-508).
This statement by Medea is where everything she has said culminates into an immense appeal to
emotion towards Jason and the audience. She has outlined all she has done for Jason, described
how he has wronged her, and now with this she shows how his wrongful actions towards her
have utterly doomed her and their children in the world. They have no where to go because
Medea put all of herself into Jason’s hands and he has now dropped Medea, and their children,
completely. Medea utilizes pathos very effectively as she succinctly builds up her argument
against Jason, making her look good and him look bad, and then presents herself as the

3. vulnerable, helpless victim as she has never done anything to deserve the treatment and
wrongdoings that Jason has taken against her.
Now, onto Jason’s rebuttal to Medea. In Jason’s argument, he negates everything that
Medea claims to have done for him. He attributes all the acts that she did for him and his survival
to the love of the gods. “But what you got in return for saving me was far more than you gave, as
I shall prove” (534-535). Jason goes onto to say that Medea has had her life improved vastly
because of him. He lays out this argument very structurally as he sets out to prove each of the
points he makes, listing them off like thesis paragraphs. All in all, he claims that he has brought
her from a barbaric country to a civilized country with justice that did not exist in her homeland.
Also, that he has allowed her to have a prestigious reputation that she would have never been
able to have in her homeland as “All the Greeks can see that [she is] wise” (539). Next, Jason
once again lays out a well-constructed argument that proves that his actions have shown “first,
that [he] is wise; second, self-controlled; finally, a great friend to [Medea] and [his] children”
(548-550). Basically, what Jason does is bring in a great deal reasoning into his rebuttal and
overall he utilizes logos extremely effectively. He outlines his act of marrying the King’s
daughter logically by concluding that what was “uppermost in [his] mind was for [them] to live
well-off” (559). He says that with all his problems and the fact that he was a fugitive, he was
lucky to have found such a scheme. He claims that he has no problem with his children and if he
has any sons with the princess it will only be so his children with Medea can make a bond to give
them prosperity. With all of these logical claims and reasons Jason presents, it is hard to see any
flaws in his argument because he backs each on up with clear and acceptable statements.
Overall, Medea and Jason both make strong arguments, through the utilization of
rhetoric, of their respective viewpoints on the problem in the play. Medea does so through pathos

4. and Jason does so through logos. The audience could be inclined to lean with either side,
however, neither Jason nor Medea concedes to one another at the conclusion of the exchange. In
the end, this causes Medea to feel even more vengeful against Jason, especially for his last lines
of his argument which downgraded her need for children against his. The resulting effect of this
is Medea’s rash decision to murder her children, rendering this stalemate debate fueled by
rhetorical tools between the two a very significant point of the play.