The True Judge
The illustration of injustice is retold continually throughout
The Brothers Karamazov: Snegiryov’s beating, the patron’s murder of the widow, the wrongful conviction of Dmitri, ect. These instances of crime are articulated as an offense against God, in which the man-made, legal system fails to prosecute justly. The courts are nothing more than a mockery of justice as emphasized in the consistency of wrongful convictions and unresolved injustices. Where society is unable to effectively punish criminals, the role of religion becomes important to impose the guilt to uncover the true judge. For the only judge able to deliver effective punishment throughout the novel is found in the conscience.
The jurisdiction of man is emphasized as unjust first with the anecdote of Father Zossima’s mysterious visitor and again in Dmitri’s trial. Dostoevsky heavily conveys how assumptions of the court are created on the feeble foundation of circumstantial evidence and unreliable witnesses in both cases of crime. The philanthropist was able to escape detection due to the circumstances of rising suspicion against one of the widow’s serfs, Pytor. The serf was tried for murder based only on circumstantial evidence and witnesses proclaiming his threats of murder. Although Pytor died before his trial reached a jurisdiction, the court and townspeople remained convinced he was guilty and investigated no further into the murder. A similar injustice reoccurred in Dmitri’s trial. The court was heavily influenced to falsely accuse Dmitri on the basis of false statements and the circumstantial evidence the lawyers greedily gathered from unreliable witnesses and Dmitri, himself.
The judgment of man is not only proven unjust, but unable to reform the convict. As Father Zossima explained in book two, chapter five, “mechanical punishment…only embitters the heart” and proceeds to turn the wrongdoer against society. The punishment Kolya inflicted upon Ilusha only succeeded in hardening the young boy into a threat to society. The court’s sentences of hard labor and prior flogging only seemed to increase the number of crimes. Father Zossima further claimed that the only effective punishment is rooted “in the recognition of sin by conscience” (p 66).
The felons in the novel only confirm Zossima’s claim. Years after the patron murdered, his conscience began to trouble him. He suffered in silence for fourteen years haunted by the blood he had shed. At first he thought of suicide, but his resolution was to admit to his crime. He admitted he accepted continuing his agony if only to spare his wife and children from the truth. Although Father Zossima had been there to help the patron to confess, the philanthropist’s conscience had already decided what he was to do. Dmitri is another example of Zossima’s assertion.
Twice Dmitri faced the faced his conscience. First, after the incident in the garden, Dmitri confessed he must punish himself. Convinced he had taken the life of Grigory, another living creature, his conscience had already decided the punishment to take his own life. Again he faced his conscience before his trial. He comes to acknowledge that although he did not kill his father, he shares a part of the responsibility as well as realize his many other sins. Before the court decided his fate, Dmitri had already come to the conclusion he must suffer through the hard labor in Siberia to redeem himself.
In both cases of criminal activity, it is not the man-made legal system that is able to examine the convict and give punishment justly. Dmitri and the philanthropist under go the process of acknowledging their sins and suffering to find redemption through their conscience. Thus, with the courts unjust and the conscience prevailing to punish and reform, the role of religion becomes more important in the process of finding the true judge.
In book two, Father Zossima’s response to Ivan implies it is through the church that man will find the true judge, the conscience. In recognizing the offense against God, the criminals will realize the offense against society. While society will turn away from the criminal, the church will not judge or deliver a punishment of moral condemnation and offers pity. If the criminal does not recognize himself as a member of the Church he’ll be left in a state of despair with nothing else to lose. The fear of moral condemnation helps to impose a sense of guilt and a desire to find redemption.
The novel emphasizes that man is unqualified to judge one another. The criminal justice system fails to open to the truth of the situations and often harden the heart. The courts are blinded by conclusions entangled in circumstantial evidence and unreliable witnesses as proven with the philanthropist and Dmitri. The church acknowledges that being human, it cannot pass judgment and will only remain friendly to the criminal and offer pity. However, if neither the court nor the church is able to be a just judge for punishment and set a path for redemption, there is little else for the criminal to turn to for judgment. In search for redemption, the criminal’s conscience becomes the only judge on which can be relied for a just punishment.
