---
title: Genesis 11:2 (JPS 1917) — And it came to pass, as they journeyed east, that they found a plain… · tree and pragmatics
description: And it came to pass, as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. Who acts: earth, language. Genesis 11:2 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Genesis 11:2 · JPS 1917

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
And it came to pass, as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there.

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**Who acts:** earth, language · **What happens:** come, pass, journey, find, dwell · **To what, where:** plain, land

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This is Genesis 11:2 · 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 (earth, language), 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:280
# text = And it came to pass, as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there.
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	3	cc	_	_
2	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	PART	TO	_	5	mark	_	_
5	pass	pass	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
7	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	9	mark	_	_
8	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	journeyed	journey	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	advcl	_	_
10	east	east	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	_
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
12	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	14	mark	_	_
13	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
14	found	find	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	csubj	_	_
15	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	plain	plain	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obj	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	land	land	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	nmod	_	_
20	of	of	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
21	Shinar	Shinar	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	nmod	_	_
22	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	25	punct	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
24	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	25	nsubj	_	_
25	dwelt	dwell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
26	there	there	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	25	advmod	_	_
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **come** | past | earth |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **pass** | to-infinitive | earth *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **journey** | past | language |  |  |  |  | east *property* | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **find** | past | language | a plain |  | the land of Shinar |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent plain=Topic |
| 5 | **dwell** | past | language |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «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 -->
וַֽיְהִ֖י בְּנָסְעָ֣ם מִקֶּ֑דֶם וַֽיִּמְצְא֥וּ בִקְעָ֛ה בְּאֶ֥רֶץ שִׁנְעָ֖ר וַיֵּ֥שְׁבוּ שָֽׁם׃

[Genesis 11:2: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and Targum Onkelos →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/GEN.11.2/)

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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:280` 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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