Most Believable Testimony In The Bamboo Grove

The Most Believable Testimony in "The Bamboo Grove" in Rashōmon
"The Bamboo Grove" is a short story written in December of 1921 by the Japanese writer, Ryūnosuke Akutagawa. The short fiction piece is included in the book, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories. The story reveals the testimonies of many people of varying social classes, describing what they remember from a crime scene, or what they have witnessed in relation to the crime that had just taken place. Some of the testimonies have overlapping information while others, vary immensely. Although most people may not believe in mediums, the most believable testimony is that of the dead man’s spirit told through a medium because it is the most accumulative, is the most descriptive and neither he nor the medium have a reason to lie unlike the other witnesses do.
The testimony of the dead man through the medium is a combination of most of the other testimonies told by primary sources. The dead man begins his testimony with a piece of information that is included in all the other testimonies of the people who were involved in the crime. He sets the scene by saying, "After the bandit had his way with my wife, he sat there on the ground, trying to

comfort her. I could say nothing, of course, and I was bound to the cedar tree" (17). This is exactly how his now widowed wife began her testimony when she was interviewed in the Kiyomizu Temple some time after his death and this is also mentioned in Tajōmaru’s testimony as well.
The testimony is extremely descriptive about his death in a way that only the dead man would know.

The other testimonies are all fairly vague when recounting exactly how the man died. The dead man’s testimony through the medium is more specific and graphic about his death. The medium says, "Lying there before me was the dagger that my wife had dropped. I picked it up and shoved it into my chest. Some kind of bloody mass rose to my mouth, but I felt no pain at all. My chest grew cold, and then everything sank into stillness" (19). The other testimonies did not paint a picture when describing the man’s death, they simply state that he is killed. From this, the imagery is quite vivid and is something that would be difficult to lie about and do so with such great

detail.
The medium would have no reason to lie in the court of law and the dead man, communicating through the medium, would not either unlike the wife. The information that the dead man included, primarily about his wife, would make sense if it were to be excluded from her testimony to protect her own reputation. The medium reiterates the dead man describing what his wife told Tajōmaru to do to him while he was tied up, "With [Tajōmaru] leading her by the hand, she was stepping out of the bamboo grove as if in a dream, when suddenly the color drained from her face and she pointed back at me. "Kill him! I can't be with you as long as he is alive!" (18). This piece of information was left out of the wife's testimony in order to help her establish the image of a mourning wife rather than an instigator and accomplice to her own husband’s death.
The dead man’s testimony communicated through the medium is the most reliable evidence given to the Magistrate. It sums up the other statements that were made by the other witnesses. It also gives a better insight into what actually happened to the man. Additionally, it uncovered some other biases in the wife’s statements. The dead man, as the victim, gives a perspective that is different from the others but was able to help the reader piece together the truth of what happened to him that night in the bamboo grove.