The Purpose Marker に
Among its many functions, the particle に may also indicate purpose. Given how に’s various usages are so interrelated, there will be three unique situations discussed in this lesson that bleed into its other functions.
①Its ability to show the goal of a verb by following the 連用形 of verbs – interrelated with its “destination” marking function.
②Its ability to show that Noun Y is the purpose “for” the predicate – interrelated with its “result” and “reason” marking functions.
③Its ability to mark Noun Y as the qualification “for” which Noun Z is being purposed “as.”
④Its ability to mark Noun Y as the reason/cause for why Noun X performs the verb of the predicate – interrelated with its “result” and “purpose” marking functions, and at times, even its ability to mark indirect objects.
①Goal: 連用形＋に＋Movement Verb
When the particle に follows the 連用形 of a verb, it indicates that said verb is the given reason for the movement (the predicate of the main clause = movement verb) by Noun X is occurring. First, let’s recap what the 連用形 of a verb looks like for all verbs applicable to this pattern.
| Verb Class | 終止形 | 連用形 |
| 上一段 | 見る | 見～ |
| 下一段 | 食べる | 食べ～ |
| 五段カ行 | 働く | 働き～ |
| 五段サ行 | 話す | 話し～ |
| 五段タ行 | 勝つ | 勝ち～ |
| 五段ナ行 | 死ぬ | 死に～ |
| 五段バ行 | 呼ぶ | 呼び～ |
| 五段マ行 | 飲む | 飲み～ |
| 五段ラ行 | 売る | 売り～ |
| 五段ワ行 | 買う | 買い～ |
| サ変 | する | し～ |
For semantic reasons, Verb 1 of this pattern cannot be the カ変 verb 来る, as it is illogical for a movement verb to be used here because that role is held by Verb 2.
1. 飲みに行きませんか。
Care to go have a drink?
2. ただ死にに来たんじゃないよ。
I didn’t just come (here) to die.
3. 家へ忘れ物を取りに帰りました。
I went home to get something I had forgotten.
4. カートを戻しに行くのが楽なように、ショッピングカート戻し置き場の近くに車を駐車したい。
I want to park my car close to where you return your shopping cart so that it’s easy to go return my cart.
5. 今日は手巻き寿司用にお刺身を買いにいらっしゃったお客様がいました。
Today, there was a customer who came to buy sashimi for use in hand-rolled sushi.
6. 佐藤さんの代理で資料を受け取りに参りました。
I have come to retrieve the materials on behalf of Sato-san.
7. 堀本さんから連絡を受けた加藤さんは、すぐに兄の和俊さんの安否を確認しに向かいました。
Kato-san, who had been contacted by Horimoto-san, immediately headed out to confirm (for himself) the wellbeing of his older brother Kazutoshi-san.
8. なかなか電話には出ない方なので、ときどきご飯を作ったりして定期的に様子を見に行っていたんです。
Since (he) is someone who hardly answers (his) phone, I would go check up on him periodically and occasionally do things like cook dinner (for him).
When Verb 1 is a する verb, its 連用形 is often dropped from the sentence.
9. 今日、買い物の最後に、ガソリンを給油（し）に行った。
Today, at the end of my shopping, I went to fill (my car) with gasoline.
10a. 母親と買い物（を）しに行った。
10b. 母親と買い物に行った。
I went shopping with my mother.
Notice how complements of the action such as “where to” can, in fact, intervene between [Verb 1 連用形＋に] and the movement verb because of the flexibility of Japanese word order.
11a. 彼氏と新宿に飲みに行きました。
11b. 新宿へ彼氏と飲みに行きました。
11c. 彼氏と飲みに新宿へ行きました。
I went to Shinjuku with my boyfriend to go drink.
We can also see に indicate the goal of an action when it follows action nouns instead of the 連用形 of the verbal rendition.
12a. 警察は彼らの救助に行った。
The police went to their rescue.
12b. 警察は彼らを救助（し）に行った。
The police went to rescue them.
13. 田中さんは海外調査にでも行っているだろう。
Tanaka-san has likely gone out to do some overseas research or the like.
②Noun Y＋に + Predicate: “For”
When Noun Y is the purpose of the predicate – but the predicate is notably not a movement verb – we see that に behaves much like the preposition “for” in English. In this scenario, Noun Y is most often a modal noun that is embellished by a subordinate clause. For instance, with the pattterns～ために (in order to) and ～ように (so that), both ため and よう stand for Noun X, and no matter what modifies them, に marks that noun as the purpose/reason for why the action stated in the predicate is happening.
14. 家族のために仕事は毎日頑張っています。
I work hard every day for my family.
15. ニュースを見るためにテレビをつけました。
I turned on the TV to watch the news.
16. ミスがないように、十分注意をしてください。
Please pay good enough attention so that there are no mistakes.
③Noun Xは＋Noun Yに＋Noun Zを: “As”
に may mark Noun Y as the qualification “for” which Noun Z is being purposed “as.” Noun X, which is the case for all the usages of に discussed in this lesson, is the agent of the sentence, which may or may not be stated. Noun Y still indicates the drive, and Noun Z is what is being acted upon. It is important to understand these roles for when these complements of the sentence are flipped around due to Japanese’s flexible word order – such as in Ex. 17 in which Noun Z (若者) is stated before Noun Y (候補者).
17. 党員たちは若者を候補者に立てた。
The party members put a young person as their candidate.
18. 私は沖縄旅行のお土産にシーサー1を買いました。
I bought a shisa as a souvenir of the trip to Okinawa.
19. この道具は何に使うんですか。
What do you use this tool for?
In Exs. 20-21, we see that the predicate is not quite the same as the ones seen in Exs. 17-19. This is because [利益を得る] and [立てこもっていた] constitute as the main clause of their respective sentences, rendering [国民の税金を元手に] and [男が知り合いの女性を人質に] respectively as subordinate clauses with their head predicates not overtly present. This can be confirmed by how inserting して after に does not affect the grammaticality of these sentences.
20. 国民の税金を元手に（して）利益を得る。
To gain profit by using the citizen’s taxes as capital.
21. 男が知り合いの女性を人質に（して）立てこもっていた。
A man had barricaded himself with a woman acquaintance of his as his hostage.
④Noun XはNoun Yに ＋ Predicate of Non-Volition
When Noun X (the doer) behaves in a way that is not indicative of a volitional2 act, に marks Noun Y as the cause/reason for it happening. By this definition, Noun Y is actually the agent (initiating factor) of the sentence. Typically, this cause sounds like a reaction to some stimulus. As for how に translates, it may end up as “at,” “from,” or even “by” depending on the equivalent verbal predicate in English.
22. 客の横柄な態度に腹を立てている。
I’m angry at customers’ arrogant behavior.
23. 周りの乗客の優しさにほっとしました。
I felt a sigh a of relief from the kindness of the passengers around (me).
24. 世界遺産の首里城正殿が火災で全焼したことに心を痛めている。
I am heartbroken by how the Main Hall of Shuri Castle, a world heritage site, completely burned down due to fire.
25. 各地で多くの人々が飢餓に倒れていきました。
A lot of people died from starvation everywhere.
26. 日本でしか見られない光景に感動しました。
I was moved by the scenes that I could only ever see in Japan.
27. 木の葉が雨に濡れてキラキラと光っている。
The leaves are glistening, having gotten wet from the rain.
28. 潮風に帆が揺れていた。
The sails were swaying from the salty sea breeze.
29. 主人公は不慣れな道筋に戸惑いながら、目的の場所を探していた。
The protagonist searched for his destination whilst perplexed by the unfamiliar route.
In the pattern Noun Y ＋ によって, we find that に may also portray the cause of the involuntarily action/event of the predicate to occur as the agent, which renders Noun X once more specifically as the “doer.” Usually, the “doer” and the “agent” if the sentence are the same, but in certain constructs such as these, they are rendered as distinct complements to the predicate. In fact, Noun X might even simply be the subject that is affected by Noun Y, with no action from it at all. How ～によって differs from just using に is that the former better translates as “due to,” suggesting some level of dependence for the effect to take place.
30. 無理なダイエットによって健康を害してしまうことも少なくありません。
It is far from uncommon for one to damage one’s health due to unreasonable dieting.
31. 地震によって多くの建物が倒壊した。
Many buildings collapsed due to the earthquake.
32. シャッターが台風によって壊れた。
The shutter [was destroyed/broke] due to the typhoon.
- A shisa is a guardian dog/lion hybrid often seen in statues and souvenirs in Okinawa. シーサー is the Okinawan word for lion, which would be シシ if it were literally translated into Japanese. ↩︎
- This is not to be misconstrued as intransitive over transitive, as verbs of either transitivity may possess or lack volition. ↩︎