“In the Penal Colony”: A religious synthesis

Many interpretations have been given to Kafka’s “In the Penal Colony”. However, it seems the when evoking the parallel assertion between “In the Penal Colony” and religion critics tend to reject this thought. Doreen F. Fowler, states in “In the Penal Colony: Kafka’s Unorthodox Theology”, that the reason for such critical rejection is, “A coherent interpretation of the biblical symbols in the story, in which all parallels function meaningfully, presents an unorthodox and uniquely personal vision of traditional theology”(113). Kafka’s inversion of traditional theology is evident and, although clearly unorthodox an analysis that discards the possibility of biblical symbols in “In the Penal Colony” is a contradictory interpretation of the text it self.

In order to expose the essential biblical symbols found in “In the Penal Colony”, Fowler briefly reconstructs major narrative developments. The first, and most evident biblical symbol is found in the commandments of the penal colony. The old commandment implemented a bizarre and merciless system of justice, which is clearly exemplified in their basic and guiding principle “Guilt is always beyond a doubt”(Kafka7). This guiding principle serves as the matter of punishment on how the sentence is carried, in which the officer gives a detailed reason to why the condemned man does not know his sentence, “It would be useless to give him that information. He experiences it on his own body”(Kafka7). The implementation of this principal tenet as said by the officer, is done by the “Apparatus” the deadly machine that inputs justice on the body of the condemn man. In this stage is evident that the intrinsic value of the old commandment is as Fowler states, “human existence is essentially character...

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...and most bizarre corners of humanity. Perhaps it is now unquestionable that in, the bible, and “In the Penal Colony”, Christ and the officer both die for a different reason. The bible affirms that Christ’ self-sacrifice freed humanity from all sin. On the contrary in “In the Penal Colony”, the officer does not die to free man from all guilt and suffering but to affirm its necessity. Fowler interprets the Christ figure connection as, “Kafka’s analogy in order to affirm that only by such suffering and death is human sinfulness to be overcome”. Finally these are the words that put in evidence the vision and unorthodox meaning of these biblical parallels. The biblical symbols that pervade Kafka’s, “In the Penal Colony” are undeniable, and it is inaccurate to discard the implicit biblical analogies due to Kafka’s unique personal criticism of the world itself.