---
title: Amos 3:6 (JPS 1917) — Shall evil befall a city, and the LORD hath not done it? · tree and pragmatics
description: Shall evil befall a city, and the LORD hath not done it? Who acts: evil, LORD. Amos 3:6 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Amos 3:6 · JPS 1917, sentence 2 of 2

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Shall evil befall a city, and the LORD hath not done it?

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**Who acts:** evil, LORD · **What happens:** befall, not do · **To what, where:** city

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This is Amos 3:6 · JPS 1917, sentence 2 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 (evil, LORD), 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:AMO:40
# text = Shall evil befall a city, and the LORD hath not done it?
1	Shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
2	evil	evil	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	befall	befall	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	city	city	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	LORD	LORD	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
10	hath	have	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Style=Arch|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	12	aux	_	_
11	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	12	advmod	_	_
12	done	do	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	3	conj	_	_
13	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	obj	_	_
14	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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- form: yes/no question
- act: ask
- voice: narrator
- polarity: none
- indirect: yes
- teacher: changed act=ask, indirect=1

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **befall** | shall | evil | a city |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **not** **do** | present · perfect | the LORD | city |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Eventuality |

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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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אִם־יִתָּקַ֤ע שׁוֹפָר֙ בְּעִ֔יר וְעָ֖ם לֹ֣א יֶחֱרָ֑דוּ אִם־תִּהְיֶ֤ה רָעָה֙ בְּעִ֔יר וַיהוָ֖ה לֹ֥א עָשָֽׂה׃

[Amos 3:6: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and Targum Jonathan →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/AMO.3.6/)

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This verse in JPS 1917:

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1. [Shall the horn be blown in a city, and the people not tremble?](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/jps/AMO.39/)
2. **Shall evil befall a city, and the LORD hath not done it?**

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**Source.** The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text, Jewish Publication Society, 1917, from eBible.org: public domain. Sentence `jps:AMO:40` 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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- ← previous: [Amos 3:6 (JPS)](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/jps/AMO.39/)
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