As of 2015, the

Japanese language is the principal language of the Japonic languages, Japonic language family spoken by the Japanese people. It has around 123 million speakers, primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language, and within the Japanese dia ...

has two translations available of the

Tirukkural The ''Tirukkuṟaḷ'' (), or shortly the ''Kural'' (), is a classic Tamil language text on commoner's morality consisting of 1,330 short couplets, or Kural (poetic form), kurals, of seven words each. The text is divided into three books wit ...

History

The first Japanese translation of the Kural text was made by

Shuzo Matsunaga (born 1921) is a Japanese engineer best known for translating the Kural into Japanese from its English version. Biography Shuzo first read a translation of a few couplets of the Kural in the 1970s and developed an interest in reading more of ...

in 1981. Work on the translation began in the 1970s when Matsunaga chanced upon a few translated lines from the original work. Through his pen-pal in India, he obtained guidance and a copy of an English translation of the work by

George Uglow Pope George Uglow Pope (24 April 1820 – 11 February 1908), or G. U. Pope, was an Anglican Christian missionary and Tamil scholar who spent 40 years in Tamil Nadu and translated many Tamil texts into English. His popular translations included t ...

. Having completed the translation by 1980, he published it the next year when he also attended the 5th World Classical Tamil Conference in

Madurai Madurai ( , , ), formerly known as Madura, is a major city in the States and union territories of India, Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is the cultural capital of Tamil Nadu and the administrative headquarters of Madurai District, which is ...

in 1981, where he presented his research essay on the Kural. Matsunaga also translated it into

Korean Korean may refer to: People and culture * Koreans, people from the Korean peninsula or of Korean descent * Korean culture * Korean language **Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Korean **Korean dialects **See also: North–South differences in t ...

. The second translation of the work was made by Japanese

Indologist Indology, also known as South Asian studies, is the academic study of the history and cultures, languages, and literature of the Indian subcontinent, and as such is a subset of Asian studies. The term ''Indology'' (in German, ''Indologie'') is ...

Takanobu Takahashi is a Japanese Indologist, who is currently associate professor of Indian literature at International Buddhist University at Osaka, Japan. He is the second translator of the Kural into Japanese. Biography Takanobu Takahashi was born in 195 ...

in 1999, which was titled ''Thirukkural: Sacred Verses of Ancient Tamil'' (ティルックラル: ティルヴァッルヴァル=著高橋孝信=訳). 南インドのタミル地方で，今もなお誰もが口にする1300余の箴言。6世紀頃につくられ，法・財・愛をテーマにインド的思考を結晶させた聖なる短詩 (ティルックラル) を，詳細な注釈で読み解く) and was published by Heibonsha,

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

. In 2023, as part of its Ancient Tamil Classics in Translations series, the

Central Institute of Classical Tamil The Central Institute of Classical Tamil (CICT) is a body established by the Government of India with a view to promoting the cause of Tamil language, Classical Tamil. It is located in Chennai. History The CICT was formerly known as the Centre ...

(CICT) in Chennai released its Japanese translation of the Kural by Balamurugan Kasinathan.

Legacy

The first Japanese translation of the Kural, which was made with the guidance of S. M. Muthu, an Indian scholar of Tamil, eventually led to the

Japanese government The Government of Japan is the central government of Japan. It consists of legislative, executive and judiciary branches and functions under the framework established by the Constitution of Japan. Japan is a unitary state, containing forty- ...

felicitating him for his services to Japanese literature by issuing commemorative stamps bearing his picture in 2007. From the 50 odd letters through which Shuzo Matsunaga corresponded with Muthu during the translation work, Shuzo went on to publish his learning about the Indian culture in a book titled ''My India As Seen Through Letters''.

References

External links

* {{Use dmy dates, date=April 2017

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

Translations into Japanese