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Galiet & Galiet
abhors slandering. He rages when Frau Grubach slanders Fräulein (T23-5). True 3⁄4 Job is a most righteous father and husband, a most charitable father to the suffering, and a most wise leader and counselor to the young, the aged, princes and noblemen (29), while Josef K is cheerful and gay, and lives for the day (T6). Howsoever blameworthy Everyman K is to G•Scholars, K is at least half a blameless Job, or half a just man. As a man of more virtue than vice, it is defensible that morality is not too challenging for him, as G•Scholars contend otherwise.128
G•Scholars, too, ignore that Josef K’s virtues partake in lofty Socratic and Aristotelian moral values. Platonically, Josef K shares none of Odysseus’ wily spirit 3⁄4 or Grecian Μῆτις 3⁄4 the cunning skill crucial to survive dreary odysseys.129 In his quest for liberty and justice, Josef K’s spirited part (thumos) sides not with his appetitive part (epithumia), but with his rational part (logos).130 His analytic skills are superbly rational, sharp — all in all, no sophistries, just doses of logic, and Nietzsche’s suspicious eye, at that. Certainly, there is no desire for a too-irrational suicide (T10) or for Job’s death wishing, but solely for life. Just as impatient as Job for a verdict and the trial to end,131 he suspects, defies and deconstructs. If Job suspects Yahweh’s schemes and plots (21:27), Josef K suspects the Court. He interrogates Wardens, Huld, the Court of Inquiry, and the institution’s mores 3⁄4 in Titorelli, the Priest, The Law, and the submissive canine-defendants. Aristotle may confidently vouch for Josef K in treading the virtuous mean between excess and lack,132 a most precarious track. As a Socratic and Aristotelian man, it is defensible that Josef K does not rationalize his moral failure, 133 as G•Scholars contend otherwise, because there is no moral failure worthy of rationalization, just as there is no possible moral criminal flaw that justifies his inexplicable arrest and execution in a world where K, too, abides by individual rights (T11, 14, 29).134
As an egocentric predator, G•Scholars go on, the Court aspires to enlighten Josef K to look inwards,135 not only to refine himself, but also to undergo a moral metamorphosis.136 Arguments arise that K examines everyone else but himself like Parsifal,137 that he puts his petition off, that he does not see he self-destructs when he refuses to confess his guilt,138 that he is hostile and deferent to the munificent court,139 and that, in delegitimizing it,140 he is beyond the law .
128 Lasine, Stuart. “Job and his Friends in the Modern World: Kafka’s The Trial.” In The Voice from the Whirlwind: Interpreting the Book of Job, ed. L. G. Perdue and W. C. Gilpin. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1992. 152
129 Detienne, Marcel and Jean-Pierre Vernant. Cunning Intelligence in Greek Culture and Society. Trans. By Janet Lloyd. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991. 1-2
130 Many of the principles Kant defends were valued by the many ancient schools of philosophy particularly Plato’s academy. For similarities in moral values, please see Plato. Republic. Book IV. 434d-441d, and Book IX. 572d.
131 Bloom, Harold. Franz Kafka’s The Trial. Modern Critical Interpretations. See Sokel, Walter. The Three Endings of Josef K. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1987. 91
132 Aristotle. Nichomachean Ethics. Book II, Chapter II. The Basic Works of Aristotle. Ed. By Richard McKeon. New York: The Modern Library, 2001.
133 Robertson, Ritchie. Kafka: Judaism, Politics, and Literature. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985. 103. In Scott, Len. Josef K.: Kafka’s Anti-Job. Vancouver: University of British Columbia, 2010. 8
134 Kafka, Franz. The Trial. Trans. By Breon Mitchell. New York: Schocken Books, 1998.
135 Marson, Eric. Kafka’s Trial: The Case Against Josef K. St. Lucia, Queensland: U Of Queensland Press, 1975. 274. In Scott, Len. Josef K.: Kafka’s Anti-Job. Vancouver: University of British Columbia, 2010. 8
136 Lasine, Stuart. “The Trials of Job and Kafka’s Josef K.” The German Quarterly, Vol. 63, No. 2, Focus: Jews and Germans/Jewish–German Literature (Spring, 1990), 195
137 Marson argues Josef K never interrogates himself a la Parsifal: Could there be possibly something wrong with him for the Court to appear suddenly in his affairs? Marson, Eric. Kafka’s Trial: The Case Against Josef K. St. Lucia, Queensland: U Of Queensland Press, 1975. 19. In Scott, Len. Josef K. Kafka’s Anti-Job. Vancouver: UBC, 2010. 8
138 Following Josef K’s dissent, the Court of Inquiry never summons him again. What’s more, the examining magistrate reminds K he has deprived himself “...of the advantage that an interrogation offers to an accused man in each case” (T52-3). See also Dodd, William. Der Prozess. Scotland: University of Glasgow French and German Publications, 1991. 38
139 When the inspector tells K that it was his duty to inform him of his arrest, K retorts that it was “a stupid duty” (T17). Josef K, during his first and only examination,isimpolite. Insteadofsubmittingtoquestioning,heruthlesslyattackstheCourt’ssenselessproceedings.SeealsoScott,Len.JosefK.:Kafka’sAnti-Job. Vancouver: University of British Columbia, 2010. 8
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