Aorist

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The aorist (abbreviated aor, pronounced /ˈeɪ.ərɨst/, from the Greek: ἀόριστος, aóristos, "without boundaries, indeterminate"[1]) is a perfective aspect (not to be confused with the perfect) of the verb in the grammatical tradition of Ancient Greek (where it is usually called aorist tense) and in languages whose description has been influenced by that tradition.[not in citation given] [2] In many of these languages, such as Modern Greek, Sanskrit, Bulgarian, and Caucasian, it is specifically the perfective past (known in other traditions as the preterite).[3] In Ancient Greek, the aorist was the unmarked (default) aspect, and in descriptions of other languages it has been used to label dissimilar unmarked forms of the verb, such as the gnomic present in Turkish and Swahili. The difference in terminology between calling this an aspect or a tense hinges on whether aorist is primarily a marker of completion or manner of performance ("aspect") or of time ("tense").

In contrast to imperfective aspects, such as the Greek imperfect, which conceive of an event or situation as unbounded, or to the perfect, which calls attention[dubious – discuss]}} to the consequences of an event or situation, the aorist conceives of an event or situation as bounded.[dubious – discuss]}} [4][5][6] (See imperfective and perfective for further illustration of this aspectual difference.) In Ancient Greek the aorist was the unmarked form of the verb, and so was used as the default form when neither the imperfect nor the perfect was appropriate.[7][8][9]

In the Greek tradition, the aorist is generally called the aorist tense. However, it is not a grammatical tense in the modern sense of the word (a point on a timeline), but aspectual,[10][11][12] or at least a combination of tense and aspect.[13][3][14][15] In some treatments, the aorist in general is called an aspect, but the aorist in the indicative mood is called a tense;[7] the Ancient Greek aorist indicative had associations with past events if not actually grammatically a past-tense form.[16] Outside the indicative, the Greek aorist usually represented a punctiliar aspect[17] or inceptive aspect.[18]

Contents

Usage in Greek

Main article: Ancient Greek grammar#Dependence of moods and tenses

In the Greek indicative mood,[3][19] the aorist generally refers to a past action, in a general way or as a completed event.[20] It may also be used to express a general statement in the present (the "gnomic aorist"),[21] less commonly a future event. Used these ways, it is described as the aorist indicative[22] or aorist tense.[20]

In other moods (subjunctive, optative, and imperative), the infinitive, and (largely) the participle, the aorist is purely aspectual.[dubious – discuss]}}[3] In these forms, it need have no temporal implication, and can act purely as a way of referring to an "action pure and simple" without the specific implications of the other aspects.

The aorist aspect is used in the imperative, for example, in the Lord's Prayer in Matthew 6:11, which says "Give (δὸς dòs, aorist imperative) us this day our daily bread".[23] In contrast, the similar passage in Luke 11:3 uses the imperfective aspect, implying a sense of continuation with "Give (δίδου dídou, present imperative) us day by day our daily bread."[24]

The aorist indicative provides a corresponding contrast with the imperfect indicative (often called "imperfect tense") in describing the past. An example of this occurs in Xenophon's Anabasis, when the Persian aristocrat Orontas is executed: "and those who had been previously in the habit of bowing (προσεκύνουν prosekúnoun, imperfect) to him, bowed (προσεκύνησαν prosekúnēsan, aorist) to him even then."[25] Here the imperfect refers to a past habitual or repeated act, and the aorist to a single one.

For comparison, the perfect indicative (often called "perfect tense") calls attention to the consequences generated by an action.[26] It is often used for the act of writing, where the ongoing consequence is a written document. A famous example is Pontius Pilate's "What I have written, I have written" (ὃ γέγραφα, γέγραφα ho gegrapha, gegrapha) in John 19:22.[27] The rare[28] perfect imperative occurs in Mark 4:39 (πεφίμωσο pephimōso);[29] this has the sense not just of "be still," as the KJV renders it, but commands an ongoing stillness, i.e. "be in a state of having been rendered harmless."[30] The perfect imperative was used in Greek mathematical language.[31]

The general rule here is that the aorist aspect lacks the specific implications of the perfect and the imperfective aspects. A table may help to clarify the above examples of this (the table does not include all uses of the aspects listed):

About the present About the past Commands or requests
Imperfective aspect Present imperfective ("present")[32] Imperfect indicative (past imperfective; e.g. προσεκύνουν prosekúnoun = "had been previously in the habit of bowing"[25]) Imperfective imperative (e.g. δίδου dídou = "give [repeatedly]")
Perfect Present perfect ("perfect tense") (expresses present consequences of past events)[26] (e.g. γέγραφα gegrapha = "I have written", οἶδα oída = "I know"[33]) Past perfect ("pluperfect tense") Perfect imperative (e.g. πεφίμωσο pephimōso = "be [ongoingly] still")
Aorist aspect Aorist indicative ("aorist tense")[20] (e.g. προσεκύνησαν prosekúnēsan = "bowed"[25]). Generally past, but often used gnomically.[21] Aorist imperative (e.g. δὸς dòs = "give")

Use in discourse

Within narration, the imperfect tends to be used to set up the background of a scene, with the aorist working in the foreground, tracing the main line of the narration.

Hermeneutic implications

Because Latin lacked an aorist, there have long been difficulties in translating the Greek New Testament into Western languages. The aorist has often been treated as making a strong statement about the aspect or even the time of an event, when in fact, due to it being the unmarked (default) form of the Greek verb, such implications are often left to context. Thus within New Testament hermeneutics, it is considered an exegetical fallacy to attach undue significance to uses of the aorist.[34] Although one may draw specific implications from an author's use of the imperfective or perfect, no such conclusions can, in general, be drawn from the use of the aorist, which may refer to an action "without specifying whether the action is unique, repeated, ingressive, instantaneous, past, or accomplished."[34] In particular, the aorist does not imply a "once for all" action, as it has commonly been misinterpreted.[35]

Usage in Sanskrit

Main article: Sanskrit verbs#Aorist system

Although quite common in older Sanskrit, the aorist is comparatively infrequent in much of classical Sanskrit, occurring, for example, 66 times in the first book of the Rāmāyaṇa, 8 times in the Hitopadeśa, 6 times in the Bhagavad-Gītā, and 6 times in the story of Śakuntalā in the Mahābhārata.[36]

In the later language, the aorist indicative had the value of a preterite, while in the older language it was closer in sense to the perfect.[36] The aorist was also used with the ancient injunctive mood, particularly in prohibitions.[37]

Usage in Bulgarian

Main article: Bulgarian verbs#Past Aorist (Aoristus)

Bulgarian has separate inflections for aorist (past imperfective) and general perfective. The aorist may be used with the imperfective, casting doubt as to whether the aorist and perfective encode the same aspect in Bulgarian. However, several Slavic languages may double up aspectual marking, producing perfective-imperfective compound aspects, and this appears to be the case with the Bulgarian aorist-imperfective.[38][3]

Usage in ancestral Indo-European

In Proto-Indo-European, the aorist appears to have originated as a series of action forms for verbs.[39] Later, this was partially replaced by a tense system based on temporal relationships.[39] The verb system of Ancient Greek can therefore be described as "at the same time an aspectual and temporal system."[40]

Many Indo-European languages have lost the aorist as a distinct feature. In the development of Latin, for example, the aorist merged with the perfect.[41] In Greek and Sanskrit, the aorist aspect is marked by several morphological devices, which in the indicative are supplemented with the past-tense augment ἐ- e-, which contracts with an initial vowel. Three aorist morphological devices stand out as most common:

present aorist
stem indicative stem indicative imperative
root with
e-grade of ablaut,
nasal infix, or suffix		 leípō
"I leave"		 Simple or strong aorist
uses the bare root.[42][43]		 élipon
"I left"		 lípe
"Leave!"
lambánō
"I take"		 élabon
"I took"		 labé
"Take!"
ágō
"I lead"		 Reduplicated aorist
doubles the first part
of the stem.[44]
It is more common
in Sanskrit than in Greek.[36]		 ḗgagon
"I led"		 ágage
"Lead!"
— Sanskrit
ájījanam
"I gave birth"		 —
phaínō
"I show"		 Sigmatic or sibilant aorist
is suffixed with s,[45]
which sometimes triggers
compensatory lengthening.		 éphēne
"I showed"		 phênon
"Show!"
other stems akoúō
"I hear"		 ḗkousa
"I heard"		 ákouson
"Hear!"
philéō
"I love"		 ephílēsa
"I loved"		 phílēson
"Love!"

References

  1. ^ ἀόριστος. Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott. A Greek-English Lexicon at Perseus Project
  2. ^ Timothy Shopen, Language Typology and Syntactic Description: Grammatical categories and the lexicon, 2nd ed., Cambridge University Press, 2007, ISBN 0521588553, p. 302.
  3. ^ a b c d e Bernard Comrie, Aspect: An introduction to the study of verbal aspect and related problems, Cambridge University Press, 1976, ISBN 0521290457, p 12: "In Ancient Greek, the Aorist is in the Indicative Mood primarily a past tense, although it does have some nonpast uses. In other moods and in nonfinite forms, the Aorist is purely aspectual, not an expression of tense."
  4. ^ Buist M. Fanning, Verbal Aspect in New Testament Greek, Oxford University Press, 1990, ISBN 0198267290, p. 97.
  5. ^ Donald J. Mastronarde, Introduction to Attic Greek, University of California Press, 1993, ISBN 0520078446, p. 148.
  6. ^ Alfred Mollin and Robert Williamson, An Introduction to Ancient Greek, 3rd ed., University Press of America, 1997, ISBN 0761808531, p. 45.
  7. ^ a b Frank Beetham, Learning Greek with Plato, Bristol Phoenix Press, 2007, p. 362.
  8. ^ John William Wenham and Henry Preston Vaughan Nunn, The Elements of New Testament Greek, 2nd ed, Cambridge University Press, 1965, ISBN 0521098424, p 96.
  9. ^ Zerwick, 1963, Biblical Greek : "« aorist » ... connotes simply the action without further determination."
  10. ^ Andrew L. Sihler, New Comparative Grammar of Greek and Latin, Oxford University Press, 1995, ISBN 0195083458, p. 445: "the aorist ... not a tense, but so called"
  11. ^ Zerwick, 1963, Biblical Greek : "the word « tenses » is put in inverted commas because the forms to be treated are but inaccurately called « tenses ». [None of the] « tenses » express the notion of time"
  12. ^ Heerak Kim, 2008, Intricately Connected: Biblical Studies, Intertextuality, and Literary Genre : "there is really no sense of tense but only of aspect which distinguishes the present from the aorist"
  13. ^ Mastronarde, p. 192.
  14. ^ Jeremy Duff and David Wenham, The Elements of New Testament Greek, 3rd ed, Cambridge University Press, 2005, ISBN 0521755514, p. 68.
  15. ^ Eugene Van Ness Goetchius, 1965, The Language of the New Testament, p 75: "In traditional grammatical terminology the imperfect and aorist are called tenses; they are actually sets of forms each of which (in the indicative mood) expresses (1) past time and (2) the particular aspect proper to the set."
  16. ^ Constantine Campbell, 2007, Verbal aspect, the indicative mood, and narrative: soundings in the Greek of the New Testament, chapter 4
  17. ^ James Morwood, 2001, Oxford Grammar of Classical Greek, Oxford, pg. 61, "Outside the aorist indicative...the aorist...tells us that it was a single event. The imperfect..., which usually suggests that the action should be seen as a continuing process, makes a helpful contrast with this use of the aorist to convey a single crisp event. We refer to the distinction between ways of expressing events and actions as aspect."
  18. ^ Eugene Van Ness Goetchius, 1965, The Language of the New Testament, Charles Scribner's Sons, pg. 262, "...the aorist [imperative] is indefinite or 'ingressive,' referring, usually, to an action which is to be commenced." Pg. 268, "...the aorist imperative is used in prohibitions in which someone is commanded not to start doing something."
  19. ^ Kenneth Leslie McKay, A New Syntax of the Verb in New Testament Greek: An aspectual approach, Peter Lang, 1994, ISBN 0820421235, p. 46.
  20. ^ a b c Beetham, p. 116.
  21. ^ a b Daniel B. Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics: An Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament, 4th ed., Zondervan, 1997, ISBN 0310218950, p. 562.
  22. ^ Beetham, p. 117.
  23. ^ Matthew 6:11, KJV. In Greek: Τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον.
  24. ^ Luke 11:3, KJV. In Greek: τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δίδου ἡμῖν τὸ καθ' ἡμέραν.
  25. ^ a b c F. Kinchin Smith and T.W. Melluish, Teach Yourself Greek, Hodder and Stoughton, 1968, p. 94.
  26. ^ a b Beetham, p. 87: "The Perfect Tense describes an action which has occurred in the past the present effects of which are still evident."
  27. ^ John 19:22, KJV.
  28. ^ C. A. E. Luschnig, An Introduction to Ancient Greek: A literary approach, 2nd ed., Hackett Publishing, 2007, ISBN 0872208893, p. 271: "The perfect imperative expresses a command that is meant to be decisive or permanent. (It is very rare.)"
  29. ^ Mark 4:39, KJV.
  30. ^ Nigel Turner, Grammatical Insights Into the New Testament, Continuum, 2004, ISBN 0567081982, p. 42.
  31. ^ William W. Goodwin, Syntax of the Moods and Tenses of the Greek Verb, Boston: Ginn and Heath, 1878 (reprinted by BiblioLife, 2009, ISBN 1103292323), p. 21.
  32. ^ John William Wenham and Henry Preston Vaughan Nunn, The Elements of New Testament Greek, 2nd ed, Cambridge University Press, 1965, ISBN 0521098424, p 27: "The Greek Present corresponds more closely in meaning to the English Present Continuous than to the Present Simple."
  33. ^ Wenham and Nunn, p. 222.
  34. ^ a b D. A. Carson, Exegetical Fallacies, Baker Book House, 1984, ISBN 0801024994, p. 70.
  35. ^ Grant R. Osborne, The Hermeneutical Spiral: A comprehensive introduction to biblical interpretation, 2nd ed., InterVarsity Press, 2006, ISBN 0830828265, p. 69.
  36. ^ a b c William Dwight Whitney, Sanskrit Grammar: Including both the Classical Language, and the older Dialects, of Veda and Brahmana, Oxford University Press, 1950, pp. 297-330.
  37. ^ T. Burrow, The Sanskrit Language, Motilal Banarsidass Publ., 2001, ISBN 8120817672, p. 299.
  38. ^ Östen Dahl, Tense and Aspect in the Languages of Europe, Walter de Gruyter, 2000, ISBN 3110157527, p. 290.
  39. ^ a b Michael Meier-Brügger, Matthias Fritz, Manfred Mayrhofer, Indo-European Linguistics, Walter de Gruyter, 2003, ISBN 3110174332, pp. 173–176.
  40. ^ Maria Napoli, Aspect and Actionality in Homeric Greek: A contrastive analysis, FrancoAngeli, 2006, ISBN 8846478363, p. 47.
  41. ^ Leonard Robert Palmer, The Latin Language, University of Oklahoma Press, 1988, ISBN 080612136X, p. 9.
  42. ^ Smyth, par. 546, 547: second aorist stem, o-verbs.
  43. ^ Anna Giacalone Ramat and Paolo Ramat (eds.), The Indo-European Languages, Routledge, 1998, ISBN 041506449X, pp. 248-251.
  44. ^ Smyth, par. 494: reduplication; par 549 (1) reduplication in 2nd aorist.
  45. ^ Herbert Weir Smyth, Greek Grammar, American Book Company, 1920, par. 542: first aorist stem.

External links

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Grammatical and lexical aspects
Complete vs. incomplete
Perfective/Aorist (Momentane) • Imperfective (Continuous and progressive • Iterative and distributive/Frequentative#)
Beginning vs. ending
Inchoative aspect/verb# • Cessative
Consequences
#Lexical aspects. Grammatical aspects unmarked.
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