The old man's defiance in prison

The old man's defiance in prison is the most concentrated eruption of radical religious protest in the novel, a moment when the accumulated violence of the penal system is met not with submission but with a prophetic condemnation that strips the entire apparatus of its legitimacy. Encountered by Nekhludoff and the Englishman during their evening tour of the exile cells in a Siberian prison, the old man—whom Nekhludoff had already noticed that morning on the ferry, refusing to cross himself and declaring that he believed in no one but himself—sits on the floor by the beds, barefooted, wearing only a dirty cinder-coloured shirt torn at one shoulder and similar trousers. His emaciated body, visible through the holes in his shirt, looks miserably weak, but his face is marked by a concentrated seriousness and animation far more intense than when Nekhludoff saw him crossing the river. As in every other cell, the prisoners jump up and stand erect when the inspector enters, but the old man remains seated. His eyes glitter and his brows frown with wrath.

The Confrontation with the Inspector

When the inspector calls out "Get up," the old man does not rise and only smiles contemptuously. He replies, "Thy servants are standing before thee. I am not thy servant. Thou bearest the seal," pointing to the inspector's forehead. The inspector, threateningly, takes a step toward him, but Nekhludoff intervenes, saying he knows this man and asking what he is imprisoned for. The inspector explains that the police have sent him because he has no passport, adding with an angry side glance that they have asked the authorities not to send such people but they do it anyway. The old man then turns on Nekhludoff, asking, "And so it seems thou, too, art one of Antichrist's army?" When Nekhludoff says he is a visitor, the old man retorts, "What, hast thou come to see how Antichrist tortures men? There, look, he has locked them up in a cage, a whole army of them. Men should eat bread in the sweat of their brow. And he has locked them up with no work to do, and feeds them like swine, so that they should turn into beasts."

The Exchange with the Englishman

The Englishman, unable to understand the old man's words, asks Nekhludoff to translate and then poses a question: ask him how one should treat those who do not keep to the laws. Nekhludoff translates. The old man laughs in a strange manner, showing his teeth, and answers with contempt: "The laws? He first robbed everybody, took all the earth, all the rights away from men, killed all those who were against him, and then wrote laws, forbidding robbery and murder. He should have written these laws before." The Englishman smiles and asks further how one should treat thieves and murderers at present. Nekhludoff translates again. The old man, frowning severely, replies: "Tell him he should take the seal of Antichrist off himself. Then there will be no thieves and murderers. Tell him so." The Englishman, after Nekhludoff translates, shrugs his shoulders and says, "He is crazy," then leaves the cell.

The Old Man's Final Proclamation

As Nekhludoff lingers, the old man continues: "Do thy business and leave them alone. Every one for himself. God knows whom to execute, whom to forgive, and we do not know. Every man be his own chief, then the chiefs will not be wanted. Go, go!" He adds, with angry, glittering eyes, "Hast thou not looked on long enough how the servants of Antichrist feed lice on men? Go, go!" The old man's defiance is not merely a personal outburst but a coherent theological and political critique: the state, its laws, its courts, its prisons, and its officials are all manifestations of Antichrist, and the only remedy is for each person to become his own chief, to reject the seal of the beast, and to live by the direct authority of God alone. His refusal to stand, his refusal to recognize the inspector's authority, and his refusal to accept the categories of crime and punishment are all of a piece with the anarchist gospel he preached on the ferry that morning, where he declared that he had no name, no place, no country, and that he was simply "Man."

Narrative Role and Thematic Significance

The old man's defiance serves as a radical counterpoint to the entire institutional logic of the novel. Where Nekhludoff's awakening leads him to work within the system—petitioning, appealing, seeking legal remedies—the old man rejects the system outright as irredeemably evil. His words echo and intensify the critique that Nekhludoff has been developing throughout his journey: that the law is merely an instrument for upholding the interests of the ruling class, that punishment does not reform but only depraves, and that the only true basis for human society is love and forgiveness. The old man's prophecy that "every man be his own chief" anticipates the anarchist conclusion toward which Nekhludoff's own reading of the Sermon on the Mount will lead him that same night. Yet the old man is dismissed as mad by the Englishman and treated as a nuisance by the inspector, and his fate—imprisoned for lacking a passport, a crime of bureaucratic rather than moral failure—underscores the absurdity of the system he condemns. His presence in the cell, alongside the dying Kryltzoff and the hundreds of other degraded prisoners, completes the picture of a world in which the innocent and the rebellious alike are crushed by a machinery that recognizes no authority but its own.