Welcome back to IsshoNihongo!
In the last post we talked about the basics of receptive sentences in Japanese. Now, let’s get into the details of how these sentences work, and why you would use them.
As always, first here is your vocabulary:
【The Main Particles At Play】
In receptive sentences, there are really only 2 particles that you will find doing the heavy lifting. These particles are は or が、and に. Sometimes you might find the particle を, but it’s not in every sentence.
が and に play very specific roles in telling us what is going on in receptive sentences - more specifically where the action is being directed. Later we will see how 2 other particles will sometimes come in and give our main particles a breather.
Now let’s look at a diagram that will (hopefully) help you understand the moving parts of receptive sentences!
Pattern 1 has four main parts, two in yellow and two in green. Here is an example sentence that I will use to explain the parts:
Let’s see this broken down into our 4 parts:
The main action is in yellow. It is 私は・られました. This means “I received”.
The secondary sentence is in green. It is 祖母に・育て. We can translate this as “grandmother’s raising”. Putting it together we get:
= as for me, I received my grandmother’s raising
= My grandmother raised me (polite).
You can see that there is a form of order within the chaos! Here’s another example:
Once again here’s a visualization of what’s going on:
This time, the topic / subject was omitted. This happens often in Japanese. We will assume that current topic is the speaker. (If it were someone else, that person would be the topic of the conversation.) The translation becomes:
= received the behind person’s push
= The person behind me pushed me (!)
Let’s spice up example 2 by adding some more details:
② けさ、電車の中で後ろの人に押されて、とてもいやだった。
= this morning, on the train, received the behind person’s push and very was annoyed
= This morning on the train, the person behind me pushed me. I was very annoyed.
That sounds much more like natural Japanese! Very often you will see / hear the “て form” of れる or られる used. It allows you to then add how you feel / felt about what happened.
I used to wonder why the actor is not marked with が. There are two reasons: 1) that’s just not how receptive sentences work. And 2) using が would put emphasis on the actor. Receptive sentences want to put (or keep) the emphasis on that main action of receiving, so using が with the actor would defeat the purpose.
For me, I like to think of the に as a “が in disguise”. (Create your own story as you wish 😂) After all, if we change the Japanese sentence to an active English sentence, the actor is what becomes the subject.
In textbooks and online, receptive sentences that follow pattern 1 are sometimes called “direct passives”. This is because the internal action is done directly to the topic / subject. Now let’s look at a 2nd pattern.
Our next pattern sees the を particle introduced. Normally, を marks the direct object of a sentence. In our pattern 2 sentences, it’s doing the same thing - just within the internal action section of the sentence.
The only thing that’s different is that now the internal action is slightly longer:
= Emi received the police’s asking a question / questions
= The police asked Emi a question / some questions.
Keep in mind that the receptive form of する is される (in example 3, it’s changed to its past tense - された). That means the translation of 質問をさ could be thought of as “asking a question”.
④ 患者が医者に薬を渡される。
= The patient receives the doctor’s giving of medicine
= The doctor gives the patient medicine.
Again, in pattern 2 sentences, the topic / subject is being directly affected by the actor.
Pattern 3 has a bit more going on. Let’s look at some examples.
Example 5 looks just like our pattern 2 examples at first glance. However if you look closer, you’ll notice something: The actor doesn’t actually do anything to the topic (the speaker).
= as for me, I received the child’s breaking of (the) glasses
= The child broke my glasses.
In example 5, this sentence by itself doesn’t tell us how the two actions are related. The only reasonable explanation is that the glasses belong to the speaker. If that were not the case, there would be no reason to say the sentence. Ah, good old Japanese ambiguity!
⑥ 父に死なれて、大学を続けられなくなった。
= I received my dad’s passing away and so, university became not able to be continued
= My dad passed away and (I was negatively affected) so I couldn’t continue going to university.
Using the regular active form of 死ぬ would of course make sense, but using the receptive form emphasizes the toll that the father’s death took on the speaker. Keep this in mind as you listen to / read native Japanese. After a while, give it a try with a native speaker and don’t be afraid to ask if what you said makes sense.
Now let’s look at some sentences that are incorrect / unnatural and try to figure out why.
The problem here is with that secondary sentence (父に母に渡さ). You see how there are two に particles? That is no bueno.
You actually CAN have two に particles in the same sentence. The thing is, the two particles must play different roles and not lead to confusion! In example 7, the subject is “flowers”, and they are receiving the action of being handed over / given. But who is handing them over and who is receiving them?? This is why one of those に particles has to go!
In this case, the particle から runs in to make the save!
In the corrected version of example 7, we can see exactly who the actor is. That leaves no doubt as to who is receiving the flowers. The translation becomes:
= flowers received the action of Dad giving them to Mom
= Dad gave (the) flowers to Mom.
In receptive sentences から can mean either “from” or “by”. Example 7 is a case where you MUST use から because having 2 に particles doing the same thing is no good. Here is another sentence that is unnatural:
から is also used when talking about what something is made of.
⑧ バターは牛乳から作られました。✅
= as for butter, from milk is made
= Butter is made from milk.
For example 9, I’ve come across conflicting information:
⑨ 私は図書館から注意されました。
私は図書館に注意されました。
= as for me, received the action of being warned by the library
= I was warned by the library.
The issue is that the actor is not a living being. I’ve seen it written that only から can be used with non-living actors, but I’m not sure how strictly this rule is followed. This is something that I will continue to ask native speakers about. Stay tuned to this space.
によって is the に particle and the て form of the verb 因る, which means “to be based on” or “to come from”. As such, it marks the source of the internal action. によって is used in receptive sentences in 2 main types of situations. The first is where the internal action is some form of creating something.
⑩ この椅子は、おばあちゃんによって作られた。
= as for this chair, it received grandma’s making
= Grandma made this chair.
In example 10, marking おばあちゃん with に would make the sentence become ambiguous. In that case に would default to its role as marking the receiver. You would be saying that the chair was made by someone for grandma. This shows that in sentences where something is created, によって can distinguish whether the object it is made BY or made FOR someone.
The second situation where you will see によって used is when the internal action has a very strong effect on the topic or subject. Examples of strong effects include death, destruction, protection, etc.
⑪ トムはたろうによっていじめられた。
= as for Tom, he received Tarō’s bullying
= Tom was bullied by Tarō.
Note that there is a clear connection between the main action and the secondary sentence. Example 11 would fall under pattern 1.
The main thing to takeaway is that に usually marks the actor. However, if there is ambiguity, the actor loses his / her / its に particle. It will be replaced by either から or によって、depending on the situation.
【WHEN You Use Receptive Sentences】
The last thing to talk about is why and when you would use receptive sentences.
In English, it’s no problem for us to constantly change the subjects of clauses / sentences.
I went to Ōsaka last month. While I was there, this Japanese guy asked ME for directions!
In the first sentence, the subject is “I”. The second sentence is a compound sentence made up of 2 parts (clauses). The first subject is “I” but the second subject is “this Japanese guy”! In Japanese, it’s possible to change the topic to “this Japanese guy” and then comment that he asked you a question. However, this would be unnatural.
It would be more natural to keep the topic as “I” and then make comments about the topic:
As for me,
・last month, went to Ōsaka
・while there, received the asking of a question by some Japanese guy
Using the receptive form is a convenient way to cut down on the changing of the conversation topic too many times. If you pay attention to Japanese conversations, you can see that the topic switches A LOT. Without receptive sentences, things would be even harder to follow - for everyone involved!
We looked at 3 patterns of receptive sentences, as well as how they are made up of two smaller, separate sentences. Most times there is a clear connection, but pattern 3 only implies this connection.
We also looked at the particles involved in these sentences (は、が、に、and sometimes を、から、and によって).
This is a lot to take in, especially since it is very different from English sentences. Take your time absorbing everything and look out / listen for these kinds of sentences in the wild. Trust me, once you’re aware of it, you’ll come across them all the time!
In the next post, we’ll be looking at a somewhat related and equally avoided sentence type: causative sentences!
