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Language is properly said to function existentially--and existentially—and thus to be existential language-whenever it is used to ask and answer our existential question, which is to say, the question that we as human beings are all always engaged in somehow asking and answering about how we are to understand ourselves together with others in the ultimate setting of our existence as parts of the encompassing whole. Language used to answer this existential question functions existentially--—either directly or indirectly. 

It functions so directly--and directly—and thus is direct existential language-whenever it is used to express a certain answer to our existential question, whether by confessing one's own self-understanding or by calling others to understand themselves in a certain way. It functions indirectly-and thus is indirect existential language-whenever it is used to explicate a certain answer to the existential question by explicating a certain self-understanding and the corresponding understanding of human existence, with its distinctive credenda-_—things to be believed--—and _ agenda---—things to be done. 

Language functioning existentially in either of these ways necessarily implies not only the meaningfulness but also the validity of language functioning in the other way. Thus language that is directly existential, in that it is used to confess or to call for a certain self-understanding, necessarily implies that language that is indirectly existential, in that it is used to explicate the same answer to the existential question, is not only meaningful but also valid. Conversely, language that is indirectly existential, in that it is used to explicate a certain answer to the existential question, necessarily implies that language that is directly existential, in that it is used to confess or to call for the same self-understanding, is as valid as it is meaningful. 

The basic unit of existential language, be it directly or indirectly existential, is the existential utterance. Thus a direct existential utterance may be said to be valid as well as meaningful if, and only if, the indirect existential utterance whose meaningfulness and validity it necessarily implies is not only meaningful but also valid---—and, conversely, an indirect existential utterance may be said to be not only meaningful but also valid if, and only if, the direct existential utterance whose meaningfulness and validity it necessarily implies is likewise valid as well as meaningful. Indirect existential utterances, however, are properly said to be existential assertions, i.e., existential utterances that make or imply a validity claim to be true and that therefore must be verifiable in some way if they are meaningful utterances. 

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