사과 한 개가 있다(있습니다/있어요).
If you translate the sentence above into English, you may get two ones.
1. I have an apple.
2. There is an apple. (or an apple exists.)
The reason why there could be two translations is that '있다' has basically two meanings: the first one is 'exist' or 'be' and the other one is (subject+) have.(depending on the context, the subject could be I, you, she or whoever. It would be appropriate to say that the subject is skipped.)
Actually, teaching Korean students English, one of the hardest parts for me to let them understand is the usage of verb 'have' because in Korean expressions of 'Subject + have(or has) something' are not used as universally as in English. There are more examples.
I have a stomachache.
배가 아프다(아픕니다/아파요).
We have snow tomorrow morning.
내일 아침 눈이 온다(옵니다/와요).
I have asked myself which is more original meaning of verb '있다(있어요)' between 'be' and 'have'. More specifically, when the ancestors who lived 200 years ago were said "사과 한 개가 있어요," for which meaning would they understand it?
I got a clue from a book I bought a few days ago.
To those who believe that "to have" is a most natural category of human existence it may come as a surprise to learn that many languages have no word for "to have." In Hebrew, for instance, "I have" must be expressed by the indirect form jesh li("it is to me"). In fact, languages that express possession in this way, rather than by "I have," predominate. It is interesting to note that in the development of many languages the construction "it is to me" is followed later on by the construction " I have," but as Emile Beveniste has pointed out, the evolution does not occur in the reverse direction. This fact suggests that the word for to have develops in connection with the development of private property, while it is absent in societies with predominantly functional property, that is, possession for use. (Fromm, Erich. To have or to be. Bloomsbury Revelations(2015), p20)
I tried imagining that I was a son of a poor peasant somewhere outside Pyeongyang 150 years ago.(my father's family fled Pyeongyang during the Korean War).
What or how many things would I have exclusively on my own? Maybe a few clothes and a pair of shoes? Most farmers could barely feed their families and cooperation in the community was the key for survival. All kinds of tools and resources were rare and had to be shared. 'To have something exclusively' was kind of evil value or a privilege confined to a few nobles. Naturally expressions with 'I have blahblah' must not have been used as often as the modern times. The modern concept of private property was introduced with the colonization by Japanese Empire in the early 20th century and spread rapidly after 1960s, when the industrial developments were organized and executed under President Park Jung Hee's regime.
Therefore, from Fromm's sociolinguistic perspectives, it would be logic to guess that the meaning of "to have" was added in "있다" with the introduction of the concept of 'private property' which is the core one in capitalism in the modern times.
