Today our school, which is an unusual school, held a Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. assembly and a shortened class day instead of giving students the day off (the holiday will be observed later in the trimester).
The assembly featured a student gospel choir, which gave one of its best concerts in recent memory.
The choir's theme song features a unique lyric whose double meaning I just got today.
Here are the first lines of the song, performed by Hezekiah Walker and the Love Fellowship Choir and entitled "I Need You To Survive."
I need you, you need me.
We're all a part of God's body.
Stand with me, agree with me.
We're all a part of God's body.
It is his will, that every need be supplied.
You are important to me, I need you to survive.
You are important to me, I need you to survive.
This is an appropriate message on the King holiday. But that last clause really hit me.
In years past, I had been hearing the meaning of "I need you to survive" with "to survive" as the finish of an indirect command, as in the statement, "I need you to get bread and milk at the store." This is the functional equivalent of saying, "Get bread and milk at the store!"
So in "I need you to survive" I was hearing "Survive!" -- almost as if the other person is in danger of dying, and the first person is encouraging the second to hang on.
But now I also understand a second meaning, in which "to survive" is the finish of a purpose clause. In "I need to go to the store to get bread and milk," the purpose clause is "to get bread and milk," and another way of putting it would be "I need to go to the story so that I may get bread and milk."
The meaning of "to survive" as a purpose clause is "I need you so that I may survive." In other words, it is not a command for the other person to stay alive, but an admission of need or weakness.
The double meaning of the clause thus successfully expresses, at the same time, the singer's simple desire for the other to live, and the simple admission that the other is necessary for the singer to live.
Happy King holiday.
Photo here.
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