---
title: Genesis 9:25 (JPS 1917) — And he said: Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unt… · tree and pragmatics
description: And he said: Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. Who acts: Japheth. Genesis 9:25 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Genesis 9:25 · JPS 1917

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And he said: Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.

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**Who acts:** Japheth · **What happens:** say, curse, be · **To what, where:** Canaan, servant · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is Genesis 9:25 · 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 (Japheth), 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:GEN:242
# text = And he said: Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.
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	:	_	5	punct	_	_
5	Cursed	curse	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	3	ccomp	_	_
6	be	be	AUX	VB	Mood=Sub|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux:pass	_	_
7	Canaan	Canaan	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	5	nsubj:pass	_	_
8	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	10	punct	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	servant	servant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	parataxis	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	servants	servant	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nmod	_	_
13	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
14	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
15	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	cop	_	_
16	unto	unto	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	brethren	brethren	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	obl	_	_
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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- form: statement
- act: other
- voice: character
- polarity: neg
- teacher: changed act=other, polarity=neg, voice=character

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | Japheth |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **curse** | infinitive · passive |  | Canaan |  |  |  |  | vn judgment-33.1-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme |
| 3 | **is a** | shall | Japheth | a servant |  |  |  | of servants; unto Japheth's brethren | tree rules |

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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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וַיֹּ֖אמֶר אָר֣וּר כְּנָ֑עַן עֶ֥בֶד עֲבָדִ֖ים יִֽהְיֶ֥ה לְאֶחָֽיו׃

[Genesis 9:25: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and Targum Onkelos →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/GEN.9.25/)

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**Source.** The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text, Jewish Publication Society, 1917, from eBible.org: public domain. Sentence `jps:GEN:242` 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: [Genesis 9:24 (JPS)](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/jps/GEN.241/)
- next →: [Genesis 9:26 (JPS)](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/jps/GEN.243/)
- ↑ back to [Genesis 9:25](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/GEN.9.25/)