Abstract

The purpose of this study is to present how Bible quotations are actually translated when there is no shared familiarity with the Bible. In order to achieve this goal, this paper seeks to answer the following three questions: whether the translators of films and movies use existent Japanese translations of the Bible when they translate quotes from the Bible, what the translations place an emphasis on, and how the translations affect the message of the original text. Citations of Psalm 23 in films and movies are analyzed in order to answer these questions. The study found that the usage of existent translations was not always referred to in a clear-cut manner. In addition, comprehension of the translated text receivers is more highly prioritized than faithfulness to the original text or to existent translations. The study also reveals that the message of the original text is changing in various ways through translation.