# The reason is <because /  that>



## Abu Bishr

Hi all

According to what I've been taught in English is that it is incorrect to say "the reason is *because* ..." and that the correct way is to say "the reason is *that* ...".

Now, my question is: how do you say it in your language? Can you say it both ways, that is, the "because" version and the "that" version?

In Afrikaans, for example, we only use the "that" version: "Die rede is dat ..." where "dat" corresponds to "that" in English. The Afrikaans word for "because" is "want" and is not used in this context. So do you, in your language, also use it without "because"?


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## sam1978

In Italian is: "Il fatto è che..." (There's not "Because")
I hope to have helped you


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## Chazzwozzer

*Turkish:*
"Bunun nedeni..."
_(The reason of this...)

__Because _is not used.


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## dn88

Hi, "because" does not work in Polish either.

"Powodem jest to, że.../Powodem jest, że.../Powód to, że..." (each meaning "The reason is that...")

or

"Powodem tego jest..." ("The reason of this is..." - that's a literal translation)

dn88


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## Aurin

In German:
Der Grund ist, dass... (The reason is that...)
If you want to use because you have the change the first part:
Das ist so, weil... (That´s so because...)


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## min300

Hi, 
 In Persian( Farsi) we don't use ' because' for this. We say ' Dalilesh ine ke' which means ' The reason is that......'.


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## jonquiliser

Yes, no because ("the reason is that" *means* because ):

*orsaken är att* (skälet är att... - orsak/skäl is roughly the distinction reason/cause, but their uses are not exactly as in English, and here you'd typically use "orsak" unless you're citing someone's opinion)

*orsaken är för att (the reason is because)

*det är så för att *(this is so because...)


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## Joannes

Same for Dutch. **De reden is omdat ...* is not correct.

Edit: Obviously you wouldn't say it with *want* either, because that's paratactic, which would be ungrammatical anyway.


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## Outsider

Portuguese:

"The reason is that..." 
"The reason is because..." may be heard sometimes, but sounds substandard to me.


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## Qcumber

After "reason", a relative pronoun or its equivalent is necessary: the reason why.
"Because"  cannot replace "why" for it is a conjunction.
So predictably, in the majority of languages, *"the reason because" should be wrong.


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## linguist786

*Hindi/Urdu:*

wajaah yeh hai ke..
(uses "that")

*Gujarati:*

kaaraN e Che ke..
(uses "that")


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## Abu Bishr

Joannes said:


> Same for Dutch. **De reden is omdat ...* is not correct.
> 
> Edit: Obviously you wouldn't say it with *want* either, because that's paratactic, which would be ungrammatical anyway.


 
Coming to think of it, in Afrikaans "omdat" would be a better translation for "because" than "want".

Now on the point of **De reden is omdat ...* being ungrammatical, do some people still use it anyway, or is it just not used at all?


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## Forero

I would not use "because" unless for some odd reason I meant to give the reason's own raison d'etre. 

"The reason I do that is (that) ..." is normal.  I don't know why, but we say "I did it for a reason" and "The reason for doing it is to ...", but there is not _for_ in "The reason I do that is ...".


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## Sakty

Abu Bishr said:


> Coming to think of it, in Afrikaans "omdat" would be a better translation for "because" than "want".
> 
> Now on the point of **De reden is omdat ...* being ungrammatical, do some people still use it anyway, or is it just not used at all?


 
I use "de reden is omdat ....." now and then , and I bet I am not the only one


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## Etcetera

In Russian, the typical phrase is Д*е*ло в том, что... / D*e*lo v tom, chto... 
You can also say П*о*водом б*ы*ло/послуж*и*ло то, что... / P*o*vodom b*y*lo/posluzh*i*lo to, chto... Yes, повод is related to the Polish 'powod'.


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## Forero

And что is _that_, not _because_, right?


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## tris

In Swedish we'd say "anledningen är" (no because) unless you really want to make it exceptionally clear why


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## ILT

In Spanish we say *la razón es que*, where *que* is the equivalent to *that*. In order to use because why (por qué in Spanish) we need a slightly different construction: la razón porque ..., the reason why, without the _is_ in the middle.

Warm regards


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## elroy

Like most other languages, Arabic uses _that_ and not _because_.  This applies to both standard Arabic and colloquial Arabic.


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## Whodunit

Aurin said:


> In German:
> Der Grund ist, dass... (The reason is that...)
> If you want to use because you have the change the first part:
> Das ist so, weil... (That´s so because...)


 
I agree. However, I just googled the phrase _Der Grund ist, weil_, and I think there are indeed situations where you might say that. This would be colloquial and is not recommended in writing:

Der Grund ist: Weil ich hier bin.
_The reason is: Because I am here._

You could as well connect them by a comma to make it a sentence:

Der Grund ist, weil ich hier bin.
_The reason is because I am here._

I think that woud work, but _dass_ (that) is not the typical conjunction after _The reason is_.


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## Etcetera

Forero said:


> And что is _that_, not _because_, right?


Yes.


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## Forero

jonquiliser said:


> Yes, no because ("the reason is that" *means* because ):
> 
> *orsaken är att* (skälet är att... - orsak/skäl is roughly the distinction reason/cause, but their uses are not exactly as in English, and here you'd typically use "orsak" unless you're citing someone's opinion)
> 
> *orsaken är för att (the reason is because)
> 
> *det är så för att *(this is so because...)



Swedish, right?  Is that literally "the reason is for that...", "this is so for that ..."?


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## Whodunit

Forero said:


> Swedish, right? Is that literally "the reason is for that...", "this is so for that ..."?


 
Yes, that's Swedish. I'd tanslate the former phrase (orsaken är att) as *The cause is that* and the latter (det är så för att) as *This is so because*. The two words "för att" would literally be _for that_, which means the same as _because_ in Swedish, I suppose.

By the way, in Latin, one would say _Causa est, quod_ (= The reason is because).


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## Arrius

My old English teacher, like *Abu Bishr*'s, also condemned _*the reason is because*_, and went on to explain that_ *the reason is because he is too tired* ,_ for instance_,_would mean that *the reason exists because he is too tired*, which is of course nonsensical (i.e. the meaning of the sentence not the explanation why it is syntactically wrong).


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## Forero

tris said:


> In Swedish we'd say "anledningen är" (no because) unless you really want to make it exceptionally clear why



Hi, tris!  And welcome to the forum.  I have 3 questions about the Swedish:

1. Is reason = _anledning_ or _orsak_?
2. What would normally follow the _är_?
3. What would you use to make it "exceptionally clear"?



Arrius said:


> My old English teacher, like *Abu Bishr*'s, also condemned _*the reason is because*_, and went on to explain that_ *the reason is because he is too tired* ,_ for instance_,_would mean that *the reason exists because he is too tired*, which is of course nonsensical (i.e. the meaning of the sentence not the explanation why it is syntactically wrong).



That's precisely my view of _because_ in English.  It introduces an adverb clause, not a noun clause.


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## Forero

Whodunit said:


> Yes, that's Swedish. I'd tanslate the former phrase (orsaken är att) as *The cause is that* and the latter (det är så för att) as *This is so because*. The two words "för att" would literally be _for that_, which means the same as _because_ in Swedish, I suppose.
> 
> By the way, in Latin, one would say _Causa est, quod_ (= The reason is because).



But _quod_ is nominative or accusative for _what_ or _that_, not _because_.  Right?

http://www.mentalcode.com/latin/adjectives/view.plx?m=qui&f=quae&n=quod

I don't really know Latin, but its descendants use a preposition to change _that_ into _because_: _per_che, _por_que, _par_ceque, etc.  I would guess either a preposition or a more "oblique" case would be the Latin æquivalent.


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## sound shift

In English "the reason is because ...", although often heard, is incorrect because the word "reason" implies causation. "The reason is because ..." is therefore sloppy. Just consider that "The reason I bought this house is because it has everything I was looking for" conveys no more information than "I bought this house because it has everything I was looking for".

In fact, this last sentence is also better than "The reason I bought this house is *that* it has everything I was looking for", because it conveys the same meaning in fewer words.


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## Aurin

jonquiliser said:


> Yes, no because ("the reason is that" *means* because ):


 


I think that is the answer why it doesn´t work in any language to say:
the reason is because
Maybe in colloquial speech it is used. But actually it seems nonsense.


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## Forero

Here's how I would use "the reason is that ..." and "the reason is because ...":

I think, therefore I am.  The reason I say that I am is that I think.  I think I am because I think.

The human being is noted for its capacity for reason.  This reason permits the human to accomplish great things.  In the opinion of M. des Cartes, the reason _is_ because the Creator put it there.

Sometimes a person will rationalize something the person has done after the fact, even to the point of creating a reason in the mind that might be a little improbable but nevertheless explains the behavior.  The reason is not to be confused with an excuse, which would justify the behavior.  The reason _is_ because the person needs an explanation, nothing more.

As opposed to a rationalization, a person may actually be aware of the real reason for a behavior.  Then the real reason probably is what the person says the reason is because the person has, for example, planned the behavior to respond to something.


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## Whodunit

Forero said:


> But _quod_ is nominative or accusative for _what_ or _that_, not _because_. Right?
> 
> http://www.mentalcode.com/latin/adjectives/view.plx?m=qui&f=quae&n=quod
> 
> I don't really know Latin, but its descendants use a preposition to change _that_ into _because_: _per_che, _por_que, _par_ceque, etc. I would guess either a preposition or a more "oblique" case would be the Latin æquivalent.


 
Well, that's funny. 

To be honest, _quod_ means both  _because_ *and* _that_. For further information, you should start a thread in the Latin forum. 

See here.


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## iyavor

In Modern Hebrew, we have a tendency not to use "the reason is because".

Althoguh "HaSiba hi sheh" exists- literally "the reason is that".

We'd probably say "zot mipnei sheh", "zot mekevan sheh", etc.


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## Zsanna

As it has already been mentioned, such use of "because" would be a rendundancy (when _reason_ = _because_) apart from bad grammar.
To be honest, I do not quite know in what way other languages can change anything about that because it "stands to reason"... 

Even in Hungarian (quite a different language) the idea is the same:

A kudarc *ok*a az volt, hogy nem voltunk felkészülve. 
The *reason* for the flop was that we weren't prepared. 

A basic type of compound sentence. One word of the main sentence (_reason_) is explained in details in the subsentence (_we weren't prepared_) introduced by _that_.

Nevertheless and for our amusement:

In Hungarian there is a wide choice of organizing the structure of sentences and among them there are these:

a) "... azért, mert..." - sg like: "the reason why..., because..." 
e.g. He went away because he did not feel well. 

as opposed to 

b) "azért, hogy" - sg like: "the reason why..., so that..." 
(e.g. He went away in order to post your letter).

_Azért_ is a type of "grammatical" word (nonesxistant in English) that indicates the type of the missing information (= reason) from the main sentence. (H_e went away_ _and I'll explain to you in a minute and in details - _in the subsentence - _what the reason was for that_). 
However.
The reason can be a "real" reason (expressed by "because") - like in sentence a) 
but it can also be an aim (expressed with "that") - like in sentence b). 
We are warned about what comes in the subsentence (reason or aim) by the conjunction used ("because" or "that"). 
So in Hungarian it can also happen that both can be used, each in a specific situation.

Edit: I've just realised that I should have given the first example with _because_ as well (to show how _reason_ and _because_ can be totally interchangeable):

There was a flop *because* we weren't prepared.


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