What does ～がままになる mean?


I saw this in a book I'm reading:

> 思考に空白が生まれ、突撃してくるキラーアントの姿を、ただ **受け入れるがままになった** 。

I'm familiar with まま but I've never seen it used that way. How should I
interpret the last part of the sentence?




Grammatical explanation could be even more confusing, but the conclusion is,
`V + がまま` has just the same meaning as `V + まま` "staying as (one) V".

> My thoughts were interrupted, and I **couldn't help allowing** the killer
> ant to charge into me ( _lit._ ...how the killer ant charges into me).

* * *

What makes you confused probably is the が. Since `がまま` is a fixed phrase using
Classical Japanese grammar, where が and の meant the opposite of what they do
today, the が should be interpreted as の. But you may notice that when verbs
qualify nouns they don't need particle の anyway. It's true, actually this
phrase is an "imitated" Classical Japanese and this が is totally redundant
with verbs. Despite this fact, the construction begets many idioms such as:
あるがまま "as it is; que sera sera*", なすがまま "at the mercy of", わがまま "selfish"
(this one is grammatically correct).

*Incidentally, this is bad Spanish, too...




Grammatical explanation could be even more confusing, but the conclusion is,
`V + がまま` has just the same meaning as `V + まま` "staying as (one) V".

> My thoughts were interrupted, and I **couldn't help allowing** the killer
> ant to charge into me ( _lit._ ...how the killer ant charges into me).

* * *

What makes you confused probably is the が. Since `がまま` is a fixed phrase using
Classical Japanese grammar, where が and の meant the opposite of what they do
today, the が should be interpreted as の. But you may notice that when verbs
qualify nouns they don't need particle の anyway. It's true, actually this
phrase is an "imitated" Classical Japanese and this が is totally redundant
with verbs. Despite this fact, the construction begets many idioms such as:
あるがまま "as it is; que sera sera*", なすがまま "at the mercy of", わがまま "selfish"
(this one is grammatically correct).

*Incidentally, this is bad Spanish, too...

