The answer to this question and your previous one is simpler than you think - it's just a question of outdated language versus modern language. 'Send not for whom the bell tolls' is an example of English from several hundred years ago. Nowadays, we would only use this kind of language when quoting literature, proverbs and other examples of language from the past. At the time when the poet John Donne was writing, four hundred years ago, it was normal to form negative imperatives by saying 'Send not..'; nowadays, we say 'Do not/Don't send'. In the past, people placed the preposition ( 'for') before the pronoun ( 'whom'); nowadays we normally put the preposition after the verb. Send not to know for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee. = archaic language Don't ask who the bell is ringing for. It's ringing for you. = modern language

The only time we ever hear "For Whom the Bell Tolls" is as the title of the book by Ernest Hemingway. You are correct that now in 2019, we rarely use the word whom. I responded to the look-at question on the other page. Let me add though: *"May I ask at what are you looking?" (in the linguistics field, an asterisk indicates something that native users would find incorrect or strange) "That is that the target at which I was shooting." (this sentence is acceptable, but unusually formal)

The origin of this phrase is from a poem by John Donne, famous English poet. (1572 - 1631) Ernest Hemingway must have copied this phrase from Donne. It refers to the bell tolling for a funeral - in the time that Donne lived, the bells rung from churches signified various things -- in this context: death. This was particularly pertinent in his time, with the Black Death ravaging England. When Donne was writing this, he may have been saying, and it is not totally clear, that we are all going to die, and, therefore, that we need to be ready. It could actually be for us in the next instant. However, it also seems, in the context of the rest of the passage, that he was saying that human beings are all interconnected. If one dies, so, in a sense, do we all.

Michael, Thank you so much always! Your explanation helps me to understand it. I'll check the sites out.

Strictly, "look" and "at" can be separated, if need be. Consider "Don't look directly at the sun". "What are you looking at" is, though, standard modern English :) The phrase in your title, "for whom the bell tolls", is a classic quotation, from a poem by John Donne, written in 1623, nearly five hundred years ago. It, and another phrase from the same poem, "No man is an island", are well known and widely loved stock phrases. To give a little context, here are the surrounding lines of poetry : "... any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee." This is not standard modern English, but it is perfectly understandable to most native speakers I think. Traditionally, or historically, a church bell would be rung ( = "a bell would toll") to mark or announce a death. So, "it tolls for thee" means something like "the bell is being rung to announce your death". ("Thee" is an old object form of an old word for you, "thou".) "Ask not" uses a traditional but now little-used way of giving a command, inverting the verb and it's negation, "not". This is not now normal English usage. "For whom the bell tolls" - this usage of "for whom" is still correct, and after prepositions like this and after quantifiers are really the main circumstances where "whom" is still used, at least in formal English. So, yes, in modern English this would translate to something very like your suggestion, "who does the bell toll for?" Some links : https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/for-whom-the-bell-tolls.html https://www.uwhealth.org/health-wellness/dont-look-directly-at-the-sun-and-other-eclipse-watching-tips/51246 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_knell https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/usage/who-or-whom https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/3329/what-is-the-difference-between-thee-and-thou I hope this helps.