---
title: Judges 9:8 (JPS 1917) — The trees went forth on a time to anoint a king over them; and they… · tree and pragmatics
description: The trees went forth on a time to anoint a king over them; and they said unto the olive-tree: Reign thou over us. Who acts: trees, thou. Judges 9:8 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/jps/JDG.268/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [Tanakh](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tanakh/) / [Nevi'im](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/) / [Judges](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/JDG/) / [chapter 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/JDG/9/) / [9:8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/JDG.9.8/) / JPS 1

# Judges 9:8 · JPS 1917

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The trees went forth on a time to anoint a king over them; and they said unto the olive-tree: Reign thou over us.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** trees, thou · **What happens:** go, anoint, say, reign · **To what, where:** king · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is Judges 9:8 · 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 (trees, thou), 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:JDG:268
# text = The trees went forth on a time to anoint a king over them; and they said unto the olive-tree: Reign thou over us.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	trees	tree	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nsubj	_	_
3	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	forth	forth	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
5	on	on	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	_
8	to	to	PART	TO	_	9	mark	_	_
9	anoint	anoint	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	advcl	_	_
10	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	_
12	over	over	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	obl	_	_
14	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	17	punct	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
16	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
17	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
18	unto	unto	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
20	olive	olive	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	compound	_	_
21	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	20	punct	_	_
22	tree	tree	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	_
23	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	24	punct	_	_
24	Reign	reign	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	ccomp	_	_
25	thou	thou	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=2|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	24	nsubj	_	_
26	over	over	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
27	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	24	obl	_	_
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- sa -->
- form: statement
- act: narrate
- voice: narrator
- polarity: none
- teacher: kept the draft

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **go** | past | the trees |  |  |  | time | forth *property* | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **anoint** | to-infinitive | the trees *not said here* | a king |  |  |  | over trees *= tree* | vn dub-29.3.2 «NP V NP NP»: agent=Agent king=Result |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | trees *= tree* |  |  |  |  | unto the olive tree | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **reign** | infinitive | thou |  |  |  |  | over us | tree rules |

<!-- .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}

<!-- .vhe dir=rtl lang=hbo -->
הָל֤וֹךְ הָֽלְכוּ֙ הָעֵצִ֔ים לִמְשֹׁ֥חַ עֲלֵיהֶ֖ם מֶ֑לֶךְ וַיֹּאמְר֥וּ לַזַּ֖יִת מָלְכָ֥ה עָלֵֽינוּ׃

[Judges 9:8: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and Targum Jonathan →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/JDG.9.8/)

<!-- div src -->

**Source.** The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text, Jewish Publication Society, 1917, from eBible.org: public domain. Sentence `jps:JDG:268` 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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [Judges 9:7 (JPS)](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/jps/JDG.267/)
- next →: [Judges 9:9 (JPS)](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/jps/JDG.269/)
- ↑ back to [Judges 9:8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/JDG.9.8/)