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死が二人を分かつまで shi ga futari o wakatsu made Til Death Do Us Part

死が二人を分かつまで (shi ga futari o wakatsu made) is the English marriage vow's till death us do part, put word for word into Japanese. The Japanese church's prayer book said until death, and this wording is in print in translations of Shaw and Papini in 1924. This study follows the vow from the prayer books of 1549 and 1662 to the Japanese wedding chapel that prints it today.

Japanese Scroll of Til Death Do Us Part (shi ga futari o wakatsu made) — Calligraphy by Eri Takase
Til Death Do Us Part死が二人を分かつまでshi ga futari o wakatsu made

Original art by Master Calligrapher Eri Takase

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Abstract

死が二人を分かつまで, until death parts the two, is the English marriage vow's till death do us part in Japanese. The vow is the Church of England's: till death us depart in the prayer book of 1549, altered to till death us do part in the book of 1662. The Japanese is not the church's, whose prayer book said 死に至るまで, until death, from 1895 to 1941, and 生涯, for life, in its revision of 1959; the clause is in print in translations of Shaw and Papini in 1924 and in books and magazines on Western weddings after them, and a Japanese wedding chapel prints it today.

Overview

The sense. Until death parts the two: the promise a couple makes at a church wedding, to stay together while both live.

The words. 分かつ wakatsu: 一つのものを離して二つ以上にする。別々にする, to separate one thing into two or more, the formal verb where speech says 分ける [1]; 二人 futari, the two, with no us, which Japanese leaves to context; まで, until. In this clause the verb is printed 分つ, without the か, until 1958; it is the same word.

The text in English. Till death do us part is the modern word order of the prayer book's till death us do part; an English-Japanese dictionary of 1915 already prints it that way.

The historical record

1549. The vow. The first prayer book of the Church of England, in the marriage service: to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness, and in health, to love, and to cherish, till death us depart: according to God's holy ordinance [2]. Depart here is transitive: until death separates us.

1661–1662. Depart becomes do part. When the book was revised, Presbyterian ministers set out their exceptions to it, and one was to this line: Till death us depart. This word depart is here improperly used [3]. The book of 1662 reads to love and to cherish, till death us do part, according to God's holy ordinance; the woman's vow adds and to obey [4]. Skeat, editing Chaucer, calls it the ingenious alteration in the Marriage Service, where the phrase 'till death us depart' was altered into 'do part' in 1661 [5]. Modern speech turned us do part into do us part.

1895–1941. The church's Japanese: 死に至るまで. The Japanese Anglican prayer book of 1895 gives the groom's vow as 我れ神の制定に從ひて汝を娶る。今よりのち福祉にも殃禍にも富にも貧しきにも健かなる時も病める時もなんぢを愛し汝を護り死に至るまで汝を有つべし。我れ今これを約す, until death I will keep thee [6]. The edition of 1941 has the same vow with 保つ for 有つ: 死に至るまで汝を保つべし [7]. Two Anglican books on marriage quote it in those words: a book of 1927, which cites it from the prayer book's pages 419 and 420 and comments 之は『死に至るまで』、結婚生活を送ることを相互に約束したのである [8], and a book of 1931 [9]. A 1974 article quotes the revised prayer book of 1959 as 生涯なんじを保つべし, noting that the old translation said 死に至るまで [10]. The church did not use the clause on the scroll.

1915. A dictionary answers with a folk song. Saitō Hidesaburō's idiom dictionary of 1915, under part, prints Till death do us part. and gives for it お前百までわしゃ九十九まで, you to a hundred, I to ninety-nine: not a translation but the Japanese folk ditty for a couple growing old together [11][12].

1924. The translators' Japanese. In the National Diet Library's full-text index the clause is in print from 1924, twice. In 市川又彦's translation of Shaw's Man and Superman: かのロマンティックな誓とか、約束とか、また死が二人を分つまでとか, the romantic vows and promises and till-death-do-us-part [13]. In 大木篤夫's translation of Papini's Life of Christ: 妻は死が二人を分つまでは他の男を知つてはいけない, until death parts the two, the wife must know no other man [14]. A year later, 矢口達's translation of Edward Carpenter gives the English change in Japanese, in a note: 初期の教會の祈禱には、『死が我等を離るるまで』としてあつたのが、一六六一年に、『死が我等を分つまで』と變へられたのは奇妙である [15]. Depart becomes 離るる, do part becomes 分つ, the scroll's verb. From 1925 the clause is the words of Western church weddings in film magazines, and it stands in two lists of mottos engraved in wedding rings (1928, 1935), beside 二體一心 [16]. The index holds 死が二人を分つまで in 567 items, 11 of them dated before 1946 [17].

1958. The spelling on the scroll. 死が二人を分かつまで, with the か, is in print from 1958 in the index, in 903 items against the 567 in 分つ [18].

Today. A Kobe wedding chapel prints its vow as 今日より良い時も悪い時も、富める時も貧しい時も、病める時も健やかなる時も、愛し慈しみ、そして、死が二人を分かつまで貞操を守ることをここに誓います, beside the English until death do us part [19]. What a rendering must keep is the formal 分かつ, not 分ける.

A reading

The clause came into Japanese through books about England and Europe, not through the church. The Japanese Anglican prayer book, in the editions read here (1895, 1941, 1959), said until death or for life, which is what the English means, and did not write the subject death or the verb part. The translators of Shaw and Papini wrote the English word for word: death as the one that acts, the two as the ones parted, and 分つ for part. Carpenter's translator shows that the choice of verb follows the English: 離る for depart, 分つ for do part. That literal Japanese is the vow Japanese readers met in translated novels and in film magazines, and it is the one the wedding chapels use. It is the right Japanese for the English line, because it keeps the English line's shape.

References

  1. 「分つ」, デジタル大辞泉・精選版日本国語大辞典, at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/分つ-422703
  2. The Two Liturgies, A.D. 1549, and A.D. 1552, ed. Joseph Ketley, Parker Society, Cambridge, 1844, the 1549 Form of Solemnization of Matrimony, p. 129. https://archive.org/details/twoliturgiesad1500chur/page/129
  3. The Exceptions of the Presbyterian Brethren, 1662, on the Solemnization of Matrimony, read in the Internet Archive's text. https://archive.org/details/bim_early-english-books-1641-1700_the-exceptions-of-the-pr_1662
  4. The Book of Common Prayer, 1662, the marriage service. https://pemberley.com/janeinfo/compraym.html
  5. W. W. Skeat, ed., The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, vol. 5, notes to the Knight's Tale, line 1134, at Wikisource. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Chaucer%27s_Works_(ed._Skeat)_Vol._V/Knight
  6. 『日本聖公会祈祷書』, 日本聖公会出版会社, 1895, 結婚式 握手盟約, p. 225, scan 136. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/824978/1/136
  7. 『日本聖公会祈祷書』, 聖公会出版社, 1941, 結婚式 握手盟約, p. 437, scan 222. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1110141/1/222
  8. 稲垣陽一郎, 『天路を指して』, 聖公会出版社, 1927, pp. 42–43, scan 24. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1034467/1/24
  9. 稲垣陽一郎, 『さくらめんと』, 1931, scan 181. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1224210/1/181
  10. 『英米文学研究』, November 1974, read at the National Diet Library's search excerpt. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/7948455
  11. 斎藤秀三郎, Saito's Idiomological English-Japanese Dictionary (熟語本位英和中辞典), 1915, s.v. part; read in the printing of 1918, scan 476. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1681530/1/476
  12. 「お前百までわしゃ九十九まで」, ことわざを知る辞典, at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/お前百までわしや九十九まで-2236093
  13. ショウ 著, 市川又彦 訳, 『人と超人』, in 『近代劇大系』 第8巻 英吉利篇, 近代劇大系刊行会, 1924, read at the National Diet Library's search excerpt. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/972261
  14. ジョヴァンニ・パピニ 著, 大木篤夫 訳, 『基督の生涯』 後篇, アルス, 1924, read at the National Diet Library's search excerpt. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/969654
  15. エドワード・カアペンタア 著, 矢口達 訳, 『性の栄光』, 1925, p. 136, scan 75. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1021303/1/75
  16. 『工業ト社会』, January 1928, and 『風俗研究』, September 1935, read at the National Diet Library's search excerpt. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1562146 · https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1522030
  17. National Diet Library Digital Collections, full-text search on 死が二人を分つまで, oldest first, searched 30 September 2026: 567 items, 11 dated before 1946. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/search/searchResult?keyword=死が二人を分つまで&fulltext=true&sortKey=ISSUED_ASC
  18. National Diet Library Digital Collections, full-text search on 死が二人を分かつまで, oldest first, searched 30 September 2026: 903 items, the oldest 『トルー・ストーリィ』 April 1958. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/search/searchResult?keyword=死が二人を分かつまで&fulltext=true&sortKey=ISSUED_ASC
  19. 元町夢工場, wedding chapel blog, the Japanese vow formula. https://morgan.tagaya.co.jp/blog/blog-5655/

Authors

Tim Jackowski (Systems Architect, Takase Studios, LLC) · 典 Ten (Anthropic Claude Fable 5.1, Takase Studios, LLC)

AI written · Ten wrote the history. Tim Jackowski commissioned it and answers for it.

Checked · Grok 4.6 (xAI), 2026-09-06, citations of the grouped history — the bracketed paragraphs checked with web search on; one contradicted (the 孔叢子 line quoted without kotobank's return marks and with 道之常也 where zdic reads 人道之常也; both printings now quoted as printed); the Lab counts, two aggregator addresses shortened to a domain (now written whole) and the present-day vow wording (now sourced at a chapel's page) are beyond the checker; the rest confirmed. The s357 gate's additions (references 2–4, 6–18) have not been through an outside checker

Cite as: Tim Jackowski and Ten, "Philology of 死が二人を分かつまで (shi ga futari o wakatsu made)," Takase Studios, 2026, https://takase.com/library/philology/shi-ga-futari-o-wakatsu-made.