Lately in The Brothers Karamazov, one of the brothers has been accused of murdering their father. His interrogation by the local authorities takes chapters and chapters, but buried in the paragraphs of dialogue are revealing gems about this particular brother's character, and how Dostoyevsky understands him in context of the story.

This particular brother says at one point, "No, not penitent, don't write that. I'm not much good myself, I'm not very beautiful, so I had no right to consider him [his father] repulsive. That's what I mean. Write that down, if you like."

Later, the authorities insist that they must strip him naked and search all his clothes. Since his clothes are blood-stained, they appropriate his clothes as evidence and give him someone else's, which fit him badly. When he returns to the interrogation room, he asks, "Well, what now? Are you going to flog me? That's all that's left for you."

Together those two pieces of insight were turning points for me in understanding this character's function. He's been a profligate, a wastrel, a sensualist, a womanizer, and a thief so far in the story. Before he's arrested, he spends the whole evening partying it up with a bunch of complete strangers and the woman he wants to seduce.

Yet I think that Dostoyevsky uses this brother's sins, together with this dialogue, as clear echoes of Christ's work. Christ, too, ate with tax collectors and sinners; Christ, though completely perfect, took our sins upon Himself in such a degree that He had committed our sins Himself. They were His; He had done them.

So it's not inappropriate for this brother, who's such a despicable person, to be surrounded by Christlike imagery at his interrogation--to be stripped, condescended to, given other clothes, and finally to feel as though he should be flogged. I haven't read far enough yet to see what punishment he does receive, but for now I'm marvelling again, as I did in Crime and Punishment, at the way Dostoyevsky so beautifully paints the complete identification of Savior with sinners.

A humbling portrait of what redemption costs.