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Question about べし (Classical Japanese)

maboroshi

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6 Jul 2017
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みんなさん、こんにちは! I have a very specific question about the usage of べし in a certain sentence, so please bear with me.
This is a line from a video game:

死神:
アトリエの絵によって、ドラキュラ様が蘇るべき玉座の間を切り離すとは…。考えたものよ。だが、これで我が主は蘇る
(For additional context, here'a link to every piece of dialogue in the game: 悪魔城ドラキュラ ギャラリーオブラビリンス ストーリー台詞集まとめ - Privatter

I could be completely off the mark here, but I get the impression the characer who is saying the above line sometimes talks a little bit in an archaic manner. For example, he uses "我" instead of "私", etc. I was wondering if べき from "蘇るべき" also is used in an archaic fashion here. I think べき might be the rentaikei of べし。

Assuming that's the case, I looked up べし in a classical dictionary and I found 6 possible meanings:

1) 推量
...そうだ。きっと…だろう。…にちがいない。…らしい。
2) 予定
…ことになっている。
3)当然
…はずだ。…にちがいない。
4)適当
…のがよい。…のが適当。
5)義務
…なければならない。
6)可能推定
…ことができそうだ。…ことができよう。
7)意思
…う。 …よう。…つもりだ。

Is there a way to determine from the context which meaning is supposed to be the right one? I'm sorry if this is a complicated question!
 
みんなさん、こんにちは! I have a very specific question about the usage of べし in a certain sentence, so please bear with me.
This is a line from a video game:

死神:
アトリエの絵によって、ドラキュラ様が蘇るべき玉座の間を切り離すとは…。考えたものよ。だが、これで我が主は蘇る
(For additional context, here'a link to every piece of dialogue in the game: 悪魔城ドラキュラ ギャラリーオブラビリンス ストーリー台詞集まとめ - Privatter

I could be completely off the mark here, but I get the impression the characer who is saying the above line sometimes talks a little bit in an archaic manner. For example, he uses "我" instead of "私", etc. I was wondering if べき from "蘇るべき" also is used in an archaic fashion here. I think べき might be the rentaikei of べし。

Assuming that's the case, I looked up べし in a classical dictionary and I found 6 possible meanings:

1) 推量
...そうだ。きっと…だろう。…にちがいない。…らしい。
2) 予定
…ことになっている。
3)当然
…はずだ。…にちがいない。
4)適当
…のがよい。…のが適当。
5)義務
…なければならない。
6)可能推定
…ことができそうだ。…ことができよう。
7)意思
…う。 …よう。…つもりだ。

Is there a way to determine from the context which meaning is supposed to be the right one? I'm sorry if this is a complicated question!
Exactly, べき is the 連体形 of べし. The meaning is the definition #2 ことになっている; "to be supposed to~" there. #3 はずの is also possible, but the translation is "to be supposed to~" anyway. Some classical words still remain and are relatively commonly used in modern Japanese, often in proverbs or set phrases (e.g. 芝生に入るべからず. べから is the 未然形 of this べし.) These "classical" words often have a "solemn" nuance.
I believe it's obvious that these are most suitable from the context.
Incidentally, the original meaning of べし is 当然または必然的にそうなることと推量する, and other meanings are derived from this.
 
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