---
title: Psalms 78:19 (JPS 1917) — Yea, they spoke against God; they said: 'Can God prepare a table in… · tree and pragmatics
description: Yea, they spoke against God; they said: 'Can God prepare a table in the wilderness? Who acts: rocks, God. Psalms 78:19 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Psalms 78:19 · JPS 1917

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Yea, they spoke against God; they said: 'Can God prepare a table in the wilderness?

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**Who acts:** rocks, God · **What happens:** speak, say, prepare · **To what, where:** table, wilderness · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is Psalms 78:19 · JPS 1917 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 (rocks, God), 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:PSA:1346
# text = Yea, they spoke against God; they said: 'Can God prepare a table in the wilderness?
1	Yea	yea	INTJ	UH	_	4	discourse	_	_
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	spoke	speak	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	against	against	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	God	God	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
7	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	9	punct	_	_
8	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
10	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	14	punct	_	_
11	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	14	punct	_	_
12	Can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
13	God	God	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	14	nsubj	_	_
14	prepare	prepare	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	ccomp	_	_
15	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	table	table	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obj	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	wilderness	wilderness	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	_
20	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	14	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 | **speak** *speech: other* | past | rocks *= rock* |  |  |  |  | against God | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | rocks *= rock* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **prepare** | can | God | a table |  | the wilderness |  |  | vn establish-55.5-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent table=Patient |

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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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וַֽיְדַבְּר֗וּ בֵּֽאלֹ֫הִ֥ים אָ֭מְרוּ הֲי֣וּכַל אֵ֑ל לַעֲרֹ֥ךְ שֻׁ֝לְחָ֗ן בַּמִּדְבָּֽר׃

[Psalms 78:19: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and the Targum →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/PSA.78.19/)

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**Source.** The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text, Jewish Publication Society, 1917, from eBible.org: public domain. Sentence `jps:PSA:1346` 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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