---
title: Job 4:17 (JPS 1917) — 'Shall mortal man be just before God? · tree and pragmatics
description: 'Shall mortal man be just before God? Who acts: mortal man. Job 4:17 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Job 4:17 · JPS 1917, sentence 1 of 2

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'Shall mortal man be just before God?

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**Who acts:** mortal man · **What happens:** be

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This is Job 4:17 · 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 (mortal man), 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:83
# text = 'Shall mortal man be just before God?
1	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	6	punct	_	_
2	Shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
3	mortal	mortal	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
5	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	cop	_	_
6	just	just	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
7	before	before	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
8	God	God	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
9	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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- form: yes/no question
- act: ask
- voice: character
- 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** | shall | mortal man |  |  |  | before God | just *property* | tree rules |

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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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הַֽ֭אֱנוֹשׁ מֵאֱל֣וֹהַ יִצְדָּ֑ק אִ֥ם מֵ֝עֹשֵׂ֗הוּ יִטְהַר־גָּֽבֶר׃

[Job 4:17: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and the Targum →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/JOB.4.17/)

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This verse in JPS 1917:

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1. **'Shall mortal man be just before God?**
2. [Shall a man be pure before his Maker?](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/jps/JOB.84/)

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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:83` 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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