---
title: Job 11:8 (JPS 1917) — It is high as heaven; what canst thou do? · tree and pragmatics
description: It is high as heaven; what canst thou do? Who acts: purpose, thou. Job 11:8 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Job 11:8 · JPS 1917, sentence 1 of 2

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It is high as heaven; what canst thou do?

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**Who acts:** purpose, thou · **What happens:** be, do

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This is Job 11:8 · JPS 1917, sentence 1 of 2 in the English of the Jewish Publication Society's 1917 translation, from Mova's open Bible corpus. The page gives the sentence's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies, parsed by Mova and checked by a teacher model — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (purpose, thou), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it. The original of the verse links back to its own tree and to the Targum.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = jps:JOB:269
# text = It is high as heaven; what canst thou do?
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	cop	_	_
3	high	high	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
4	as	as	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	heaven	heaven	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	_
6	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	10	punct	_	_
7	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	10	obj	_	_
8	canst	can	AUX	MD	Style=Arch|VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
9	thou	thou	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=2|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	10	nsubj	_	_
10	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	conj	_	_
11	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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- form: yes/no question
- act: ask
- voice: narrator
- polarity: none
- teacher: kept the draft

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present | purpose |  |  |  |  | as heaven; high *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **do** | can | thou |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent what=Eventuality |

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One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

## The Hebrew of this verse {#hebrew}

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גָּבְהֵ֣י שָׁ֭מַיִם מַה־תִּפְעָ֑ל עֲמֻקָּ֥ה מִ֝שְּׁא֗וֹל מַה־תֵּדָֽע׃

[Job 11:8: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and the Targum →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/JOB.11.8/)

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This verse in JPS 1917:

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1. **It is high as heaven; what canst thou do?**
2. [Deeper than the nether-world; what canst thou know?](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/jps/JOB.270/)

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**Source.** The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text, Jewish Publication Society, 1917, from eBible.org: public domain. Sentence `jps:JOB:269` of Mova's parse database.

**The tree and the speech act** come from Mova's cycle: the small model's draft, read by a large model as teacher, passed by Mova's gates (Elamur Cosmic License). **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the chapter read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence of the chapter.

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- ← previous: [Job 11:7 (JPS)](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/jps/JOB.268/)
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