Passive Form

This verb form has three functions:

1. The regular passive (the Topic of the passive sentence is normally in the Object place in an active sentence)
2. The affective passive (the speaker wants to express an event that he or she finds undesirable)
3. The speaker shows respect to the Topic of the sentence.

• Group 1 and Group 2: Change the final vowel u to a and add れる
• Group 3: くる→こられる、する→される

There is no passive form for stative and honorific verbs: e.g. ある ("exist"), いる ("need"), くださる (honorific "give me").

Consider the single vowel u （う） at the end of certain verbs such as kau （かう） as having the hidden consonant w before the vowel u. In other words, the original form of kau （かう） is ka(w)u. For instance, the passive form of the verb かう is かわれる rather than かあれる.

The following sentence illustrates the affective passive:

The following is an example of a regular passive:

This verb form also expresses the speaker’s respect towards the Topic of the sentence.