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In this sentence:
The commission commanded that work on the building should cease.
Why isn't the used before the word work? It seems that the work is specified by on the building.
Another example is,
Construction of the building will start next week.
I understand construction here is something like putting up the building, and so the construction isn’t general in meaning. But the definite article isn’t used here, either.
I’ve asked about this several times, but none gave me a good answer.
We use "the work" to indicate some particular work, some specified project on one portion of the edifice, such as (for example) replacing the walls in one office, or repairing the elevators. For this reason, we really never say "the work on the building," because "the work" doesn't encompass the entire structure, whereas "on" the building does generally imply we are talking about the entire structure. If we were referring to a specific project, such as replacing the elevators, we might say "the work being done on the building."
"Work on the building" is used almost exclusively to refer to the totality of all work involved in constructing a building. In other words, it stands in for "building the building," which we don't say because of the awkwardness of repeating the word "building." We might also use "work on the building" it if the work involved really is work that affects the entire building, such as a complete, massive renovation.
The best answer I can come up with, is that different people view "work" on a building (and "construction" of a building) in different ways.
One who uses the article views the work process as collective. In other words, we are all working together on this building. The construction of this building requires a single collective work effort. The phrase, "the work", best describes this.
On the other hand, one who chooses to use no article is using "work" as a mass noun (which generally lack an article, as in the case of the word water: "the glass is filled with water", vs. "the glass is filled with the water"... the latter sounds awkward, unless you are referring to a specific source of water), and they are trying to encompass not only the greater collective "work" that is being done, but the individual "work" being performed by each individual member of a crew.
In this particular case, in the first example, they want to make sure that nobody is doing anything to work on that building, and so, rather than viewing all work on the building as a single "work", they are viewing it as a plural, with masons, bricklayers, carpenters, plumbers, etc. providing individual work.
The same principal applies in the second example, with it viewed as a process of a collaborative effort made up of everyone's individual efforts, rather than as a singular collective effort.
Really, there is no real reason why it is written this way, except, perhaps, as a "politically correct" way of appeasing workers who are putting a great deal of effort into a project. Whether or not anyone actually picks up on this is debatable; however, you will find the article-less "work" used far more uniformly in announcements made to workers than in announcements made to those for whom the building is being worked on and in literature.
