---
title: Numbers 9:16 (JPS 1917) — So it was alway: the cloud covered it, and the appearance of fire by… · tree and pragmatics
description: So it was alway: the cloud covered it, and the appearance of fire by night. Who acts: cloud. Numbers 9:16 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Numbers 9:16 · JPS 1917

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So it was alway: the cloud covered it, and the appearance of fire by night.

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**Who acts:** cloud · **What happens:** cover · **To what, where:** tabernacle

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This is Numbers 9:16 · 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 (cloud), 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:NUM:392
# text = So it was alway: the cloud covered it, and the appearance of fire by night.
1	So	so	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
2	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	alway	alway	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
5	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	8	punct	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	cloud	cloud	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	_
8	covered	cover	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
9	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	obj	_	_
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	appearance	appearance	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	conj	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	fire	fire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	nmod	_	_
16	by	by	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	night	night	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	nmod	_	_
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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- form: statement
- act: narrate
- voice: narrator
- polarity: none
- teacher: changed act=narrate

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **cover** | past | the cloud | tabernacle |  |  |  |  | vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme it=Destination |

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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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כֵּ֚ן יִהְיֶ֣ה תָמִ֔יד הֶעָנָ֖ן יְכַסֶּ֑נּוּ וּמַרְאֵה־אֵ֖שׁ לָֽיְלָה׃

[Numbers 9:16: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and Targum Onkelos →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/torah/NUM.9.16/)

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**Source.** The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text, Jewish Publication Society, 1917, from eBible.org: public domain. Sentence `jps:NUM:392` 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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