---
title: Psalms 139:11 (JPS 1917) — And if I say: 'Surely the darkness shall envelop me, and the light a… · tree and pragmatics
description: And if I say: 'Surely the darkness shall envelop me, and the light about me shall be night'; Who acts: I, darkness, light. Psalms 139:11 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Psalms 139:11 · JPS 1917

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And if I say: 'Surely the darkness shall envelop me, and the light about me shall be night';

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**Who acts:** I, darkness, light · **What happens:** say, envelop, be · **To what, where:** me, night · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is Psalms 139:11 · 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 (I, darkness, light), 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:2535
# text = And if I say: 'Surely the darkness shall envelop me, and the light about me shall be night';
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
3	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	say	say	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	11	advcl	_	_
5	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	11	punct	_	_
6	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	11	punct	_	_
7	Surely	surely	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	darkness	darkness	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
10	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
11	envelop	envelop	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
12	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	11	obj	_	_
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	light	light	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	nsubj	_	_
17	about	about	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	16	nmod	_	_
19	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
20	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	cop	_	_
21	night	night	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	conj	_	_
22	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	11	punct	_	_
23	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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- form: statement
- act: assert
- voice: character
- polarity: none
- teacher: changed voice=character

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* *a condition, not said to happen* | present | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **envelop** | shall | the darkness | me |  |  |  | surely *property* | vn contiguous\_location-47.8 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme i=Co-Theme |
| 3 | **is a** | shall | the light about me | night |  |  |  |  | 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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וָ֭אֹמַר אַךְ־חֹ֣שֶׁךְ יְשׁוּפֵ֑נִי וְ֝לַ֗יְלָה א֣וֹר בַּעֲדֵֽנִי׃

[Psalms 139:11: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and the Targum →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/PSA.139.11/)

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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:2535` 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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