Like any concept, the truth is a construct of intelligence, and it is a construct of men. But we do not have complete control over how it is constructed, because it is based on the input we gather from our surroundings, and produced using various methods and formulas. We'd like to believe our truth coincides with reality. But, in hindsight, it seems as though we hardly ever knew what we were talking about, which makes anything we believe now or in future, to be suspected.
For a long time now, Akira Kurosawa’s film Rashomon has kept me thinking about whether or not the truth is out there. It is true that with every incident the truth is distorted, simply because it is filtered first by those who’ve experienced it and then by those who have heard about it. Rashomon (1950), is Kurosawa’s masterpiece which transports viewers to a unique dimension - challenging their thinking on screen, moralising not through any structured argument, nor in incomprehensible language, but with the help of tasteful storytelling, enthralling imagery and exquisite cinematography.
A brief background about the movie will place my argument better. A samurai – is killed in the middle of a forest, while his wife is apparently attacked by the attacker too. There are a few witnesses who engaged with the couple before the incident took place and after. One by one, all those involved in this incident are brought before a jury. The woodcutter who saw the dead body of the Samurai talks of the horror that seized him when he stumbled upon the body. The priest claimed that he had seen the couple earlier and identified a suspect. Then the attacker, Tajomaru, is brought in. In his version of the story he tied up the Samurai, seduced his wife right in front of him, and afterwards killed the Samurai in a sword-fight, honourably. It’s then the turn of the Samurai’s wife to give her testimony. In her story, she claims to have been raped by Tajomaru, who left without harming her husband. After she was raped, she untied her husband, but collapsed right after only to wake up and find her husband dead next to her, also claiming that he committed suicide.
More than any of these version the one which is quite compelling, is the version of the dead samurai himself. After Tajomaru sleeps with his wife, the attacker begs her to go away with him, which she falls for on the condition that he must kill her husband. But Tajomaru suddenly changes sides and supports her husband. Somehow the woman manages to escape and the bandit unties the samurai and leaves after which latter commits suicide. What we hear next is yet another version of the woodcutter’s. Even though he witnessed the entire incident he does not tell the court. He opens up after the trial is over. In this account after Tajomaru sleeps with the lady, he begs her to marry him. Unmoved, she frees her husband and challenges him to fight Tajomaru. The samurai engages Tajomaru in a sword-fight, in which he succumb his injuries.
Kurosawa’s characters look at the same world, yet for moral or cognitive reasons their accounts of what they see are worlds in themselves, making it impossible to know what the truth of the world is like. The film’s ultimate message is that we are inherently unable to speak the truth. The ideology and philosophy behind the film and at the core of Kurosawa’s direction is clear. What if we can never really know and figure out what’s going on? What if every version we produce or are exposed to about the world around is a world unto itself and what if each person’s account is completely separated from other accounts of the same incident? The only conclusion that can be drawn here is that we will never know the truth or the true version of anything that we hear about unless we experience or witness it first hand.
Truth is a concept that has exists independently. It all starts by having a look at the fundamental laws of logic and the first principles of reason. The notion of truth is a subject untouched in the world today as most people don't want to bother thinking too much even though most if not all of us hold on to absolute views and supposed ‘truths’. If we all hold to certain truths then what is the source of these truths? Does there even need to be a source of truth, an absolute truth by which you derive your conclusions from? Can we know what a crooked line looks like if we have never seen a straight line? Or is this where faith comes in? Do we need faith or something to keep us believing something to be true? Is truth something we cannot really know?
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