Japan

我主イイススハリストスノ新約, Waga Shu Iisusu Harisutosu no Shin'yaku, and Bible. New Testament. Japanese. 1901.
我主イイススハリストスノ新約, Waga Shu Iisusu Harisutosu no Shin'yaku, and Bible. New Testament. Japanese. 1901.
我主イイススハリストスノ新約, Waga Shu Iisusu Harisutosu no Shin'yaku, and Bible. New Testament. Japanese. 1901.
我主イイススハリストスノ新約, Waga Shu Iisusu Harisutosu no Shin'yaku, and Bible. New Testament. Japanese. 1901.
我主イイススハリストスノ新約, Waga Shu Iisusu Harisutosu no Shin'yaku, and Bible. New Testament. Japanese. 1901.
我主イイススハリストスノ新約, Waga Shu Iisusu Harisutosu no Shin'yaku, and Bible. New Testament. Japanese. 1901.

"A graduate student is doing research on a Japanese writer who is an Orthodox Christian. The user would like to have the access to a Japanese Orthodox Bible. Less than 1% of Japanese are Christians. According to Wikipedia, the population of the Japanese Orthodox Church is estimated at 46,000. The Japanese Orthodox Bible is, therefore, a rarely available item. In OCLC, only LC and a Theological Union Library in California hold this title in North America.

When the East Asian Studies Liaison Librarian planned her acquisition/networking trip to Japan in December 2017, she decided to hunt for this Bible. She visited the Holy Resurrection Cathedral in Tokyo (復活大聖堂, also known as Nikorai-doニコライ堂), the main cathedral of the Japanese Orthodox Church in Chiyoda, Tokyo. She visited it during the Sunday service when the church compound was open and there were plenty of church members around. She went to the church office to talk to church staff and asked about the Bible. Luckily, there was a small corner bookstore in the office for the benefit of church members. She found that only the New Testament of the Orthodox Bible had ever been translated to Japanese. She was able to purchase this 2010 reprint of the 1901 translation of the Orthodox New Testament, with the title 我主イイススハリストスノ新約 (Waga Shu Iisusu Harisutosu no Shin'yaku) and attended an interesting tour of the church about the church building and about the history and current condition of the Japanese Orthodox."

  • Meng-fen Su, East Asian Studies Librarian