Quote:
Originally Posted by Kejebra
A certainly peculiar thing that I have been wondering about, others too I've discovered, it was stated by Chryuop here
"I have a question. It is something that really been wandering in my head for a long time. Why some words have a meaning in Kanji, but they are always used with other kanji to get to the same meaning?
For example 現 in itself already mean "reality", why not using that kanji alone?"
So the question is: Do I really need both kanjis for the world reality, whats the difference? |
There is, indeed, a significant difference. Instead of thinking of all Kanji as standalone words, think of them as components. The same sort of idea exists in English, and for similar reasons.
Kanji are not originally Japanese. They were "borrowed" from Chinese, and applied to the Japanese language. Over time a lot of things have become very strongly intertwined, but in the end they are not (except for a few special cases) originally Japanese. Written Japanese combines these components to form specific meanings.
A similar example in English would be the use of Latin and Greek roots for words. Segments themselves carry meaning, but in most cases they are combined to form the final word. Alone, and you would just sound strange.
In both languages, this is particularly strong when it comes to ideas and concepts that are not easily defined.
In English, the word "reality" is formed from "real" and "ity" - "real" being the part that carries the actual meaning, "ity" just transforms it into a noun. But yet I doubt that you would use "real" in place of "reality" - it simply wouldn`t be correct.