The sentence:

> ほかにも先勝{せんしょう} **は** 午後{ごご} **は** 良{よ}くない日{ひ}とされ、反対{はんたい}に、先負{せんぶ} **は**
> 午後{ごご} **が** 良{よ}い日{ひ}とされ、また赤口{しゃっこう} **は** 昼{ひる}だけ **が** 良{よ}い日{ひ}だとされています。

No matter how much I progress in Japanese, the 「は」and「が」 distinction still
gets the better of me. I can't justify why 「は」 was used to many times,
especially. Is this kind of sentence pattern unusual? It's in my Japanese
textbook.

I was under the impression that in sentences that have a passive voice (e.g.
される, right?), then 「は」 would normally become 「に」. E.g., 食器洗いが誰かにされた → The
washing up was done by somebody.
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2012-06-02T18:46:40.593
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2012-06-03T03:37:59.833
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particles
How can the uses of 「は」and「が」 in this sentence be justified?
I agree with Sawa's comment, saying that consistency would require "先勝は午後が."
Now, assuming that:

# On は

  * We're talking about three things that we introduce: A, B, and C. It's thus normal to enumerate them using "は":

> Aは…です。Bは…です。Cは…です。
>
When you group everything in one sentence, you get Aは…で、Bは…で、Cは…です。

which is basically the structure of your sentence, except that you have
"され(ています)" instead of "で(す)".

# On が

Without even thinking, just learn the patterns AはBが良い and AはBが良くない, meaning "B
is good/bad for A". We have three of them here; for example: "The afternoon
isn't good for the `early winners''" (`early winners'' being whatever
translation you use for 先勝).

This pattern is exactly like "AはBが好きです" or "AはBがありません"。

# On passive

The person doing the action in passive voice is indeed given by に. However,
this actor can be implicit, as is the case now. The sentences are of the form:

> (it is understood that) afternoon is bad for early winners

where the subject of する is undefined, to make the statement generic, à la "it
is said that." I don't believe that it is the moment of the day that _causes_
bad luck, it is just when bad luck strikes. Passive is just commenting how the
three groups are classified (by you, me, or anything else, which is not
explicit.)
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2012-07-10T06:16:21.270
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2012-07-19T22:48:58.950
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(I know I shouldn't post my answer this late)

If there are not any previous contexts, it's because the speaker is feeling
that 良くない is more difficult to associate (hence more important) with the
context (先勝は…日で) than 午後, and 良い is easier (hence less important) to associate
with the context (先勝は…先負は…日で) than 午後.

Actually I guess there's a previous context that refers to a day when good
fortune continues all the day or vice versa. That's why it adopts は in the
first clause, to express contrast.
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