Learning Arabic, I see some examples of triliteral roots from which words with apparently different meanings are derived. Example:
- "to break apart or tear": فَطَرَ • (faṭara) (maybe cognate with Hebrew פתר (f-t-r) "to solve"?)
- "to create": same word, فَطَرَ
- "heaven, sky, firmament": سَمَاء (samāʾ) (cognate with Hebrew שָׁמַיִם, "heaven, sky" or "God"?)
- "name": اِسْم (ism)
These examples make me curious: "break apart" seems unrelated to "create", and "heaven" seems unrelated to "name".
In Semitic languages like Arabic and Hebrew, is it always the case that two words with the same triliteral root are etymologically related? Or for example is it possible that two words with different origins in an older language both got mapped to the same triliteral root? And are there any tricks for figuring out when this has happened?