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Thanks, clear and concise.thumbs up

Great lesson. I'm still trying to get my head around the difference between passive voice verbs and the passive participle. Are these pretty similar for some verbs? For example, am I correct in thinking that الرسالة يُكتَب means "the letter is (being) written," while الرسالة مكتوب means "the letter is (already has been) written"? If so, what about the past tense form of the passive verb, for example, الرسالة كُتِبَ? What would be the translation for this, and how would it be different from الرسالة مكتوب?

Hope my question makes sense. Meanwhile, my grammar book is confusing me further by saying that form VII also has a passive meaning...

@Shamsayn

Passive voice is used when the subject of the sentence is unknown.

ماذا يُكتَب في الرسالة؟
What is written in the letter?
(Passive voice - present tense)

ماذا كُتِبَت في الرسالة؟
What was written in the letter?
(Passive voice – past tense)

Passive participle is used to mean a person or a thing to indicate past or completed action. Though it is derived from the verb, it functions as a noun or an adjective.

ما المكتوب في الرسالة
What is written in the letter?
(maa is used here instead of maadhaa, as the passive participle functions as a noun)

الرسالة المكتوبة بخطّ اليد
The handwritten letter
(maktooba is used here, as the passive participle functions as an adjective)

Form VII verb has a passive meaning, and hence its passive voice form in the past tense does not exist.

There is a mistake in the sentence given as an example for ‘Passive voice – Past tense’ in my previous comment.

If a preposition follows a passive voice verb, it has to be conjugated in the masculine singular form, irrespective of the gender of the object.

Hence, ‘What was written in the letter?’ should be
ماذا كُتِبَ في الرسالة؟

Thanks for the explanation!