Lesson 31: The BA conditional. What it really means and how to use it easily.

Japanese conditionals are easier than you think! This week we take the ba conditional form and show how it works and in what ways it differs from the others. ▼See More ▼

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[franckvincent]

Tip for learners: the "ba", "reba" form finally clicked for me when someone pointed out that it doesn't matter if a verb is godan or ichidan, you just remove the final "u" of the verb and replace it with "eba", even the irregular verbs Suru (Sureba) and Kuru (Kureba). So much easier to remember !!!

[dashdashdot]

Your description of する and くる as strong ichidan verbs gave me one of my biggest AHA moments of your course so far! I've said it before, but I'm so glad I found you. I do wish other teachers wouldn't be so scared of explaining grammar. Surely, if you're going to be successful at a language, you need to understand why you're saying what you're saying, not just repeat things parrot-fashion.

[KiranasOfRizon]

I find it very interesting that saying "I must go" in Japanese (行かなければいけない) can literally be broken down to "if (I) don't go, (it) won't go"

[BabyBallascore]

Beautiful. The clouds of conditionals and "must" form that I got from Tae Kim are starting to clear.

[supechube_k]

i was taught なきゃ as a form on its own to mean "have to" and i always thought it looked a bit off, like it was hiding some deeper etymology from some shortening or something but i always was too lazy to actually research it the reason i thought this is because palatalization( when an い-column kana has a little ゃ, ゅ or ょ after it) is very rare in native japanese words and grammar forms.

[GeekNeverDie]

Wow. I remember learning by heart the structure ければいけません from a textbook. I especially remember the frustration from this nonsense patch that I had to add just to say "must". But it all makes sense now. Thank you !

[PoolsJones]

Thank you so much for this specific video. I was struggling with the "if I don't do… it will not do" construction. Now I'm much closer making it part of my functional speech.

[heatth]

Thanks for breaking things down likes this! I learned from a textbook to say "なければなりません" to mean "must", which gets further confusing when I learned latter "なければいけない" and "ないと" means the same thing. Even though I latter learned the conditionals and could see this was clearly where these constructions came from, it never quite made sense to me, because I originally learned them as fixed structures. Thanks again for shining light on this for me.

[DANGJOS]

Ah this makes sense! I remember in the first episode of Darling in the Franxx (Spoiler Alert), Hiro says 助けなきゃ to Zero Two when he thinks she's drowning. I remember reading Jisho before saying that it means if this doesn't happen, or if this isn't the case, then this (something like that). But I figured, in that moment, Hiro was just saying "I have to/must save her". I try to watch anime without English subtitles, by the way.

[rtzcbgf]

I have question about nouns. If ば is used for hypotheticals, so it makes sense we can't apply it to the noun. But in tim kae's guide he wrote that for noun we should attach であれば. And yes, sorry for asking you question about what you haven't written, but here again I can't understand why で is used. Why not があれば？So it would be "if <noun> exist(s/ed) ".

[alexshemwell]

I love the way she says hypotheticals in this lesson.

[noblewolfwriting]

This video makes this concept seem really so easy to grasp. Yet somehow I've struggled to internalize it in my understanding. Possibly because I don't recognize it often enough yet in the immersion I do, or maybe I didn't pay well enough attention when watching this video. Who knows. Though hopefully I'll remember it with this pass through and won't need to come back. Fingers crossed at least.

[AEHaldy]

Long time watcher, first time commenter. CureDolly, you have helped me undo a lot of old, bad teaching from text books. 本当にありがとう!

Like I think I saw someone else comment here, I have long been a little uncertain on the differences between various conditionals, and usually apply ~けば and ~たっら somewhat randomly, so I look forward to hearing what you have to say on that. Also, curious if you have any comments on ~べき, in regards to saying "should" in Japanese. I realize it's not a conditional, but it's another case where I have been uncertain whether it's better to use a ~べき construct, or something like ~ほうがいい...

[caiodesousakasakevic]

FINALLY I UNDERSTAND THE "MUST" IN JAPANESE

[seventhsheaven]

Thanks dolly! Conditionals have always been a pain since there seems to be so many. I’m starting to understand the differences now but definitely for a beginner it can be overwhelming.

Um, btw, I still have a ton of vocab to memorise for the JLPT I’m taking in Dec. I’m doing my best but I wondered if anyone had any tips on cramming vocab fast? Of course I won’t be able to remember absolutely everything (and the test won’t have everything in it either, ) but I want to remember as much as I can. I have a flash card app and a master list of the vocab I need. Anyone have any tried-and-tested methods? I’d appreciate it a lot 😘

[pazispeace]

Androids are geniuses, but キュアドリー先生 is ahead of them

[dantheman]

Excellent video as always. I wanted to ask about the ”何故行かなければいけない?". I was trying to unpack that since you've demonstrated time and again that Japanese isn't made up of a random set of rules to be memorized. So I guess first いけない which I assume is 行く and when put into the potential, is either literally "cannot go" or metaphorically "won't go" as in won't go over well. Therefore the statement is something along the lines of "Why if not-go won't go over well?" which interpreted into natural English comes to Why should I go, or why must I go? Is that the logic behind it?

[nickinlondon]

A very helpful lesson, thank you. I've never understood the difference between the -ba conditional and the -tara one, so I'm particularly looking forward to the next lesson (which I assume will deal with this). And why is the -ba form called the 'provisional conditional' whereas the -tara form is called the conditional??? I am hoping that all will be explained!

[konradnaszynski]

Could you clarify a little bit the implications of how it would be different when using と/れば　in this and the previous lesson's examples.

傘を持ってくればよかった　 vs 　傘を持ってくるとよかった　（based on the literal translation the "should" feels implied in both cases.）
それをたべれば病気になる　vs 　それをたべると病気になる

[herlescraft]

me reading some light novel:

" ば ", what did ば mean...
OH, i remember... FIND ME THAT SHEEP!!!

and here I am :P