---
title: Song of Songs 4:10 (JPS 1917) — How fair is thy love, my sister, my bride! how much better is thy lo… · tree and pragmatics
description: How fair is thy love, my sister, my bride! how much better is thy love than wine! and the smell of thine ointments than all manner of spices! Who acts: love, thy, ointments. Song of Songs 4:10 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Song of Songs 4:10 · JPS 1917

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
How fair is thy love, my sister, my bride! how much better is thy love than wine! and the smell of thine ointments than all manner of spices!

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**Who acts:** love, thy, ointments · **What happens:** be, love, smell

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This is Song of Songs 4:10 · 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 (love, thy, ointments), 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:SNG:56
# text = How fair is thy love, my sister, my bride! how much better is thy love than wine! and the smell of thine ointments than all manner of spices!
1	How	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	2	advmod	_	_
2	fair	fair	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
3	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	2	cop	_	_
4	thy	thy	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	love	love	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	nsubj	_	_
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
7	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	8	nmod:poss	_	_
8	sister	sister	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	vocative	_	_
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
10	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	bride	bride	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	vocative	_	_
12	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
13	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	14	advmod	_	_
14	much	much	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	better	good	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	2	parataxis	_	_
16	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	15	cop	_	_
17	thy	thy	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	love	love	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
19	than	than	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	wine	wine	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	_
21	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	15	punct	_	_
22	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	smell	smell	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	conj	_	_
25	of	of	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
26	thine	thy	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	27	nmod:poss	_	_
27	ointments	ointment	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	24	nmod	_	_
28	than	than	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
29	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	30	det	_	_
30	manner	manner	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	orphan	_	_
31	of	of	ADP	IN	_	32	case	_	_
32	spices	spice	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	30	nmod	_	_
33	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	15	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- sa -->
- form: exclamation
- act: express
- voice: character
- polarity: pos
- teacher: kept the draft

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present | thy love |  |  |  |  | my sister *vocative*; my bride *vocative*; fair *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **is** | present | thy love |  |  |  |  | than wine; good *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **love** |  | thy |  |  |  |  |  | nom love «feeling transitive»: poss=agent |
| 4 | **love** |  | thy |  |  |  |  |  | nom love «feeling transitive»: poss=agent |
| 5 | **smell** |  | thine ointments |  |  |  |  |  | nom smell «cognition intransitive»: of=agent |

<!-- .note -->
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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מַה־יָּפ֥וּ דֹדַ֖יִךְ אֲחֹתִ֣י כַלָּ֑ה מַה־טֹּ֤בוּ דֹדַ֙יִךְ֙ מִיַּ֔יִן וְרֵ֥יחַ שְׁמָנַ֖יִךְ מִכָּל־בְּשָׂמִֽים׃

[Song of Songs 4:10: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and the Targum →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/SNG.4.10/)

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**Source.** The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text, Jewish Publication Society, 1917, from eBible.org: public domain. Sentence `jps:SNG:56` 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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