Japanese Passive and Causative Forms: Formation and Use

Japanese has two conjugations that describe who does what to whom: the passive, where something is done to you, and the causative, where you make or let someone else do it. They are mirror images — one moves the action toward you, one pushes it away — and they combine into a third form, the causative-passive, which means you were made to do something you did not want to do.

They belong together for a practical reason: all three are built from the same two stems, they all collide with the potential form, and the passive in particular has a use that English simply does not have.

Part 1: The passive

How to build it

The godan passive uses the あ-row, the same stem as the nai-form: 書か + ない, 書か + れる. Note that う-ending verbs again take わ rather than あ — 買う → 買われる, not 買あれる.

The result is an ichidan verb, so it conjugates normally from there: 書かれます (kakaremasu), 書かれて (kakarete), 書かれない (kakarenai).

The shape of a passive sentence

English passive sentences often drop the agent ("the window was broken"). Japanese usually keeps it, marked with に.

• 私は先生に褒められました (watashi wa sensei ni homeraremashita) — I was praised by the teacher
• 犬に噛まれました (inu ni kamaremashita) — I was bitten by a dog
• 友達に笑われました (tomodachi ni warawaremashita) — I was laughed at by my friend

The agent takes に. This is the same に that marks a direction or a target, which is a useful way to remember it: the action travels from the agent to you.

One exception worth knowing: when the agent is a creator rather than a doer — a book written by someone, a building designed by someone — Japanese prefers によって (ni yotte). この本は夏目漱石によって書かれました (kono hon wa natsume souseki ni yotte kakaremashita, "this book was written by Natsume Soseki"). に would suggest Soseki did something to the book rather than created it.

The adversity passive English has no equivalent for

Here is the part that has no English analogue, and the reason Japanese uses the passive far more than English does.

Japanese can make a passive sentence out of a verb that has no direct object and no real "victim" in the English sense. What the passive adds is not "was done to" but "and it affected me badly".

None of these is passive in English. "It rained" is not something that happens to the rain. But in Japanese, 雨に降られた frames the rain as an event that descended on the speaker and inconvenienced them. The subject is the sufferer.

This is called 迷惑の受身 (meiwaku no ukemi), the "nuisance passive" or adversity passive. It appears constantly in real Japanese and almost never in textbooks, which is why learners can read a sentence like 子供に泣かれて、寝られなかった (kodomo ni nakarete, nerarenakatta, "the child cried and I couldn't sleep") and be baffled by a passive with no apparent passive meaning.

There is a related pattern with body parts and possessions, where the thing affected takes を and the owner stays the subject:

• 足を踏まれました (ashi o fumaremashita) — I had my foot stepped on
• 財布を盗まれました (saifu o nusumaremashita) — I had my wallet stolen
• 名前を間違えられました (namae o machigaeraremashita) — I had my name got wrong

English says "I had my wallet stolen"; Japanese says "I was stolen as to my wallet". Same idea, different machinery.

The impersonal passive in writing

Japanese also uses the passive where English would use "people" or "one", reporting an opinion without naming who holds it. 言われている (iwarete iru, "it is said"), 考えられている (kangaerarete iru, "it is thought"), 知られている (shirarete iru, "it is known"), 行われた (okonawareta, "was carried out"). It is a strong marker of formal register: recognise it in reading, but you rarely need to produce it early on.

Part 2: The causative

How to build it

Same あ-row stem as the passive and the nai-form. 書か + れる (passive), 書か + せる (causative), 書か + ない (negative). One stem, three endings.

Two meanings: make and let

The causative covers both "make someone do" and "let someone do", and English splits these into two different verbs. Context decides which.

When it is genuinely ambiguous, Japanese disambiguates with 〜させてあげる (sasete ageru, "let, as a favour"), which makes the "let" reading explicit.

に or を for the person being made to act

The person who is made to do something is normally marked with に. But when the verb is intransitive — especially a verb of motion — を is used instead, because に is already needed for the destination.

In 子供を学校に行かせる, the に belongs to 学校 (the destination), so the child takes を. This is why textbooks tell beginners to "use に for the causative" and then quietly introduce を a chapter later.

The short causative

In casual speech, godan verbs often use a shortened causative: 〜す instead of 〜せる.

Both are understood everywhere; the short form is common in conversation and in fiction dialogue, and rare in formal writing.

Polite and beneficial uses

Two causative patterns are worth learning as fixed units, because they are how ordinary politeness works in Japanese:

These are the "let" sense used for the speaker's own benefit: asking permission, not imposing.

Part 3: The causative-passive

Stack the causative and the passive and you get "was made to do something, and did not want to". This is a genuine everyday form, not an advanced curiosity — it is how Japanese complains about being forced.

The godan form has two versions. 行かされる is the shorter and far more common one; 行かせられる is the textbook form and is often avoided because せられる is a mouthful.

The nuance is consistently unwillingness. 残業させられた is not a neutral report of overtime; it carries the complaint. If you want to say you were made to do something you were happy about, this is the wrong form.

The three forms side by side

One verb, three directions of action. This table is worth memorising as a unit.

Note the collisions: 食べられる is both the passive and the potential, and 食べさせられる (causative-passive) differs from it by only the させ in the middle.

Common mistakes for English speakers

Using られる for a godan passive. 行かれる is passive; the potential is 行ける. This is the most frequent error in the whole family, because ichidan verbs use られる for both and English speakers generalise it.

Marking the agent with から or によって when に is right. 先生から褒められた sounds like a gift from the teacher. For a person who did something to you, use に. Reserve によって for creators and for formal writing.

Missing the adversity passive entirely. When 雨に降られた shows up, English speakers look for a victim and find none, then translate it as a plain statement about rain. The sentence is about the speaker being inconvenienced. Recognising this reading is essential for listening and reading.

Making a causative out of an intransitive verb and keeping に. 子供に学校に行かせる is wrong — the child takes を: 子供を学校に行かせる.

Assuming the causative only means "make". It also means "let", and contexts like 好きなだけ食べさせてください are permissive. Picking the wrong one reverses the sentence's meaning.

Using the causative-passive for neutral events. 褒めさせられた would mean "I was made to praise (someone)" and implies reluctance. If you simply received praise, that is 褒められた.

Confusing させられる with させてもらう. させられる is being forced. させてもらう (sasete morau) is receiving permission — "I was allowed to do". They are opposites in feeling, and only a few kana apart.

Forgetting that the short causative exists. 行かす and 待たす in dialogue are causatives, not unfamiliar verbs — the same form at a faster register.

How to keep them apart

The three forms share one stem and differ by one ending, so the useful technique is contrast, not isolation: take one verb and say all its forms in a row — 書く、書かれる、書かせる、書かされる、書ける — until the differences are audible rather than analytical. What changes is the kana after 書か: れ for passive, せ for causative, さ for causative-passive, and the え-row 書け for potential.

The harder skill is reading: deciding mid-sentence whether 食べられる means "is eaten" or "can eat", whether 雨に降られた is about rain or about you. That comes from seeing the patterns in context, not from a table.

Romaji.live practice puts these forms in whole sentences with the surrounding context intact — you type homeraremashita, then ikasareru, and the gloss appears once you get it right, which is the moment the passive and the causative stop looking alike. Build the base under it with verb classification, or compare the collision directly with the potential form.