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# Speaking to One's Heart: דבר and its Semantic Extension

**Authors:** Natalie Mylonas, Stephen Llewelyn, Gareth Wearne · **Year:** 2016 · **Venue:** Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 16, article 7 **Link:** [doi.org/10.5508/jhs.2016.v16.a7](https://doi.org/10.5508/jhs.2016.v16.a7) · **Licence:** JHS open access, no licence on the article page — treated as copyrighted, summary only

[**2** citations](https://openalex.org/works?filter=cites:W2746745752) openalex · 2026-10-18[Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 16](https://openalex.org/S2764683527)

- [Publisher's page](https://doi.org/10.5508/jhs.2016.v16.a7)
- [PDF](https://jhsonline.org/index.php/jhs/article/download/29358/21376)
- [DOI 10.5508/jhs.2016.v16.a7](https://doi.org/10.5508/jhs.2016.v16.a7)
- [OpenAlex](https://openalex.org/W2746745752)

**Authors (3)**

1. [Natalie Mylonas](https://openalex.org/A5086847774) h 2 · 4 citations · 8 works
2. [Stephen Llewelyn](https://openalex.org/A5026383425) [ORCID](https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0992-2178) · h 8 · 208 citations · 40 works
3. [Gareth Wearne](https://openalex.org/A5047389314) [ORCID](https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8426-5553) · h 3 · 65 citations · 23 works

Citations and author metrics from openalex (2026-10-18); authors with the same name are not always told apart.

## What it is about

The lexicons list many senses for דָּבָר: word, matter, affair, deed, thing, anything, plan, decision, request. The authors explain them as a radial category built mainly by metonymic chains. Part for whole: one "word" stands for a whole utterance, and is then glossed by the kind of speech act it is (report, command, request, claim). Medium for message: words stand for what they express — thoughts, plans, intentions, a decision (Deut 17:8–11), linked to the idiom "to speak in one's heart". With the verb "to do", דָּבָר becomes the act or event, and then the thing acted on. Beyond metonymy, a grammaticalised use: indefinite דָּבָר under negation means "anything/nothing" (Gen 19:8, 22; Deut 22:26), and in construct before a noun it individuates ("such a vile thing", Judg 19:24). Senses overlap even within one passage, so the same gloss cannot be assumed for nearby occurrences.

## Ideas

- I1. Sense rules for דָּבָר in the Torah dictionary, by construction: object of a verb of speaking or with לֵאמֹר → "word(s)/speech"; object of עָשָׂה, especially with הַזֶּה → "thing/deed"; indefinite under לֹא/אַל or in a question → "anything/nothing"; in construct before an abstract noun (דְּבַר הַמִּשְׁפָּט) → the kind named by that noun. Measure each rule against the JPS rendering of every Torah occurrence.
- I2. "Speak in/to one's heart" (אָמַר/דִּבֶּר בְּלִבּוֹ / אֶל לִבּוֹ) → inner speech: a `prag` rule giving the quote voice "thought", not spoken dialogue.
- I3. A radial-sense layout for polysemous dictionary entries: core sense first, each extension tagged with its link (part-for-whole, medium-for-message, act, grammatical) so the entry says why the sense exists.
- I4. When דָּבָר stands for an utterance, the speech-act label of `prag` (command, request, report) can serve as its gloss; check whether the act of the quote that follows agrees with the English noun JPS uses.

## For Mova

I1 and I3 are for the Torah dictionary (`macula dict`) and [The lexicon](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/hbo/10-lexicon/) (polysemy). I2 and I4 are candidate rules for `tools/macula/src/prag.rs` (voice; act), written up in `09-discourse.md` (direct speech).

## Cite

The paper itself, not this card. BibTeX from the library's record of the work. [DOI 10.5508/jhs.2016.v16.a7](https://doi.org/10.5508/jhs.2016.v16.a7)

```
@article{mylonas2016speaking,
  title = {{Speaking to One's Heart: דבר and its Semantic Extension}},
  author = {Mylonas, Natalie and Llewelyn, Stephen and Wearne, Gareth},
  journal = {Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 16},
  year = {2016},
  doi = {10.5508/jhs.2016.v16.a7},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.5508/jhs.2016.v16.a7}
}
```

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