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I'm currently studying Japanese from Nihongo Sou Matome N1 book, and I would like your help in order to understand this grammar pattern.
I'm a little bit confused about its meaning, because in the first sentence, ～ては seems to mean "when". However, in the second sentence, ～ては seems to mean "since, because, due to". So, as these two meanings are quite different from each other, I would like to know what does ～ては really mean.
Thank you so much in advance for your help!
This (as opposed to a couple of other) usage of ては is, to my mind, just an emphatic use of て form. Importantly, however, it is used where the outcome – or the subjective comment on the outcome – is negative. A little more specifically, in a sentence Aては、B, A expresses the action or state for which the following negative statement B applies.
You sound a little confused about the similar and different usages of 'if', 'when', and 'because' in English... but I would say that you've almost certainly confronted this problem before, when translating たら from Japanese to English. So perhaps thinking about when you translate たら as 'if' vs 'when' will help you to understand this use of ては.
Other example usages of this ては are:
こんなに忙しくては、新聞も読めない。
こんなに働かされては、病気になってしまうよ。
あの男が来ては、邪魔になる。
(taken from Makino & Tsutsui's 'A Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar')
Hope that helps!
(I would, as an aside, suggest you find another resource to complement Nihongo Sou Matome, as it (clearly!) lacks sufficient (or any) explanation of the grammar points. It's not nearly enough to just have the translation, especially when their translations are often awkward in English, and occasionally just simply incorrect. Best of luck!)
