This is a fragment from Rabbeinu Yonah's Gates of Repentance, that reminds me a lot of some literary motives in the work of F. Kafka. I do not have any information though that Kafka was familiar with those writings.
'In the Midrash (Kohelles Rabbah 7:`15), our Sages, of blessed memory, compared his situation to that of a band of thieves. Having been captured and imprisoned by the king, together they dug a tunnel through which to escape the dungeon. All escaped but one gang member, who was afraid of the unknown path which lay before him. When the jail warden discovered the breach and saw the man who saw the man who stayed behindm he began strike him with his rod, exclaiming: 'Miserable soul! Don't you see the breach opened wide before you - why did you not seize the opportunity to save yourself as well?' (Shaarei Teshuvah I:2)
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