Breakdown of Het is moeilijk om het onbekende te ervaren.
zijn
to be
het
it
moeilijk
difficult
te
to (infinitive marker)
Questions & Answers about Het is moeilijk om het onbekende te ervaren.
Why do we add an -e to onbekend here?
This is how you turn an adjective into a noun for an abstract concept. By adding an -e and putting het in front, the adjective onbekend (unknown) becomes the noun het onbekende (the unknown).
Could onbekende mean an unknown person instead of an abstract concept?
If it referred to an unknown person (a stranger), it would take a different article: de onbekende. Because we use het here, we know it refers specifically to the abstract idea of the unknown.
Why does het onbekende come right in the middle of om and te ervaren?
In Dutch, when you use the om ... te + infinitive structure, any objects or extra details belong inside that sandwich. Since het onbekende is the object of the verb ervaren, it must go between om and te.
The sentence starts with Het and then uses het again. Are they doing the same thing?
No, they have entirely different jobs. The first Het is a placeholder subject, just like the 'It' in the English phrase 'It is difficult'. The second het is the definite article 'the', belonging to onbekende.