---
title: Exodus 33:20 (JPS 1917) — And He said: 'Thou canst not see My face, for man shall not see Me a… · tree and pragmatics
description: And He said: 'Thou canst not see My face, for man shall not see Me and live.' Who acts: LORD, Thou, man. Exodus 33:20 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Exodus 33:20 · JPS 1917

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And He said: 'Thou canst not see My face, for man shall not see Me and live.'

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**Who acts:** LORD, Thou, man · **What happens:** say, not see, live · **To what, where:** face, Me · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is Exodus 33:20 · 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 (LORD, Thou, man), 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:EXO:1003
# text = And He said: 'Thou canst not see My face, for man shall not see Me and live.'
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	3	cc	_	_
2	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	9	punct	_	_
5	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	9	punct	_	_
6	Thou	thou	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=2|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	9	nsubj	_	_
7	canst	can	AUX	MD	Style=Arch|VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
8	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	9	advmod	_	_
9	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	ccomp	_	_
10	My	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	face	face	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	_
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
13	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	17	mark	_	_
14	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nsubj	_	_
15	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	17	aux	_	_
16	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	17	advmod	_	_
17	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	advcl	_	_
18	Me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	17	obj	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	live	live	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	conj	_	_
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
22	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | LORD |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **not** **see** | can | Thou | My face |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer face=Stimulus |
| 3 | **not** **see** | shall | man | Me |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer i=Stimulus |
| 4 | **live** | infinitive | man *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn exist-47.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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 -->
וַיֹּ֕אמֶר לֹ֥א תוּכַ֖ל לִרְאֹ֣ת אֶת־פָּנָ֑י כִּ֛י לֹֽא־יִרְאַ֥נִי הָאָדָ֖ם וָחָֽי׃

[Exodus 33:20: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and Targum Onkelos →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/EXO.33.20/)

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**Source.** The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text, Jewish Publication Society, 1917, from eBible.org: public domain. Sentence `jps:EXO:1003` 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: [Exodus 33:19 (JPS)](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/jps/EXO.1002/)
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- ↑ back to [Exodus 33:20](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/EXO.33.20/)