---
title: Genesis 17:15 (JPS 1917) — And God said unto Abraham: 'As for Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not ca… · tree and pragmatics
description: And God said unto Abraham: 'As for Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall her name be. Who acts: God, thou, wife, Sarah. Genesis 17:15 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Genesis 17:15 · JPS 1917

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And God said unto Abraham: 'As for Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall her name be.

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**Who acts:** God, thou, wife, Sarah · **What happens:** say, not call, name · **To what, where:** name · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is Genesis 17:15 · 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 (God, thou, wife, Sarah), 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:428
# text = And God said unto Abraham: 'As for Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall her name be.
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	3	cc	_	_
2	God	God	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	unto	unto	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	Abraham	Abraham	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	obl	_	_
6	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	17	punct	_	_
7	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	17	punct	_	_
8	As	as	ADP	IN	ExtPos=ADP	10	case	_	_
9	for	for	ADP	IN	_	8	fixed	_	_
10	Sarai	Sarai	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	_
11	thy	thy	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	12	nmod:poss	_	_
12	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	appos	_	_
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
14	thou	thou	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=2|PronType=Prs|Style=Arch	17	nsubj	_	_
15	shalt	shall	AUX	MD	Style=Arch|VerbForm=Fin	17	aux	_	_
16	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	17	advmod	_	_
17	call	call	VERB	VB	Mood=Ind|VerbForm=Fin	3	ccomp	_	_
18	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	19	nmod:poss	_	_
19	name	name	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	_
20	Sarai	Sarai	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	appos	_	_
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	_
22	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	27	cc	_	_
23	Sarah	Sarah	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	27	nsubj	_	_
24	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	27	aux	_	_
25	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	name	name	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	nsubj	_	_
27	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	conj	_	_
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- sa -->
- form: statement
- act: assert
- voice: character
- polarity: none
- teacher: changed form=decl, act=assert

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | God |  |  |  |  | unto Abraham | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **not** **call** | shall | thou | wife's name |  |  |  | as Sarai | vn initiate\_communication-37.4.2-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent name=Recipient |
| 3 | **name** |  | wife |  |  |  |  |  | nom name «communication transitive»: poss=agent |
| 4 | **name** |  | Sarah |  |  |  |  |  | nom name «communication transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .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 -->
וַיֹּ֤אמֶר אֱלֹהִים֙ אֶל־אַבְרָהָ֔ם שָׂרַ֣י אִשְׁתְּךָ֔ לֹא־תִקְרָ֥א אֶת־שְׁמָ֖הּ שָׂרָ֑י כִּ֥י שָׂרָ֖ה שְׁמָֽהּ׃

[Genesis 17:15: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and Targum Onkelos →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/GEN.17.15/)

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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:428` 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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