---
title: Psalms 38:17 (JPS 1917) — For I said: 'Lest they rejoice over me; when my foot slippeth, they… · tree and pragmatics
description: For I said: 'Lest they rejoice over me; when my foot slippeth, they magnify themselves against me.' Who acts: I, man, foot. Psalms 38:17 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Psalms 38:17 · JPS 1917

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For I said: 'Lest they rejoice over me; when my foot slippeth, they magnify themselves against me.'

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**Who acts:** I, man, foot · **What happens:** say, rejoice, slip, magnify · **To what, where:** man · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is Psalms 38:17 · 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, man, foot), 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:630
# text = For I said: 'Lest they rejoice over me; when my foot slippeth, they magnify themselves against me.'
1	For	for	SCONJ	IN	_	3	mark	_	_
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	3	punct	_	_
5	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	8	punct	_	_
6	Lest	lest	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
7	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	rejoice	rejoice	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	18	advcl	_	_
9	over	over	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
10	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	8	obl	_	_
11	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	18	punct	_	_
12	when	when	SCONJ	WRB	_	15	mark	_	_
13	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	foot	foot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
15	slippeth	slip	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Style=Arch|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	18	advcl	_	_
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
17	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	magnify	magnify	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
19	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	18	obj	_	_
20	against	against	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
21	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	obl	_	_
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	18	punct	_	_
23	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	18	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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- form: statement
- act: assert
- 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 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **rejoice** | present | man |  |  |  |  | over me | vn marvel-31.3 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 3 | **slip** | present | my foot |  |  |  |  |  | vn calibratable\_cos-45.6.1-1 «NP.attribute V»: agent=Attribute |
| 4 | **magnify** | present | man | man |  |  |  | against me | vn remedy-45.7-1 «NP V NP.patient»: agent=Agent themselves=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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כִּֽי־אָ֭מַרְתִּי פֶּן־יִשְׂמְחוּ־לִ֑י בְּמ֥וֹט רַ֝גְלִ֗י עָלַ֥י הִגְדִּֽילוּ׃

[Psalms 38:17: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and the Targum →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/PSA.38.17/)

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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:630` 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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