I cannot get my head around the verb 「済ます」／「済まされない」 in this sentence.
月10万円では済まされない。
I found this in the プログレッシブ和英中辞典 on goo dictionary's page for the verb 「済ます」. The page says that the sentence means I can't make do with 100,000 yen a month.
This is fine, I think I can understand the sentence and if I see something like this in the future I think I can recognize it.
However, as the goo dictionary page is about 「済ます」 and not 「済む」 I'm bound to think that [済まされない] is the passive conjugation of the former. But, if I translate this to English or to my native tongue (Hungarian) the sentence/expression/meaning doesn't sounds passive (to me) at all (forgive me if my translating skills are way off about this).
Can someone explain to me how the verb or verb conjugation can be interpreted "passively" in sentences? Thanks!
Answer
It's true that 〜(ら)れる is often referred to as a "passive" form because that's one of its main uses, but it has other uses as well. They can be divided into four categories:
- 受身 - passive (most common)
- 可能 - potential
- 尊敬 - honorific
- 自発 - spontaneous (least common)
This is an example of the potential use of 〜(ら)れる, here inflected to the negative 〜れない, meaning 〜することができない. You can see this reflected in the English translation in the word "can't":
月10万円では済まされない。
I can't make do with 100,000 yen a month.
Here, 済まされない means 済ますことができない.
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