A polyphenylene ether resin composition comprising a polyphenylene ether, wherein the polyphenylene ether has a polymer chain comprising recurring units each represented by the following formula (1): and has the following characteristics (a), (b) and (c): (a) when the polyphenylene ether is analyzed by 1H-NMR, the polyphenylene ether exhibits a triplet signal (S1) at 3.55 ppm, wherein the triplet signal (S1) has a relative intensity of 0.05 to 0.25 in terms of the percentage of the integrated intensity of the triplet signal (S1), based on the integrated intensity of a signal (S2) observed at 6.47 ppm; (b) the polyphenylene ether exhibits an absorbance of from 0.01 to 0.40 at a wavelength of 480 nm; and (c) the polyphenylene ether has a weight average molecular weight of from 30,000 to 100,000.