Sir Richard C. Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Oedipus at Colonus

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μοίραις ποεῖσθε could not stand for “ἐν μοίραις ποιεῖσθε”. The prep. “ἐν” is indispensable. See the discussion of this passage in the Appendix. The gentlest remedy would be μοίρας (as gen. sing.), which two MSS. have. As “ἐν οὐδενὶ λόγῳ ποιεῖσθαι” (Her. 3.50) and “ἐν οὐδεμιᾷ μοίρᾳ ἄγειν” (2. 172) are parallel phrases, so “οὐδενὸς λόγου ποιεῖσθαι” (1. 33) might suggest “οὐδεμιᾶς μοίρας ποιεῖσθαι”. For the two negatives cp. El. 336 “καὶ μὴ δοκεῖν μὲν δρᾶν τι πημαίνειν δὲ μή”, "and not to seem active yet do no harm." It is hollow, Oed. says, to insist so strictly on the sanctity of a grove (“θεοὺς τιμῶντες”), and then to refuse the gods their “μοῖρα”, their due tribute of practical piety. You treat the gods as if they were not, when at their shrines you do “ἀνόσια ἔργα” (283) by violating your pledge to a suppliant.

ποεῖσθε. Numerous Attic inscriptions of the 5th and 4th cent. B.C. show that in this verb “ι” was regularly omitted before “ει” or “η” (“ποεῖ, ποήσει”), though never before “ου, οι”, or “ω” (“ἐποίουν, ποιοίη, ποιῶν”: Meisterhans, p. 27). L generally, but not always, omits the “ι” before “ει” or “η” if the syll. is short. Forms from “ποιῶ”, with the 1st syll. short, occur below in 459, 584, 652, 1018, 1033, 1037, 1144. In 584 and 652, as here, L keeps the “ι”: in the other five places it omits it. In 1517, where the quantity is different, L has “ποεῖν”.