Aorist[a] (abbreviatedAOR)verb forms usually expressperfective aspect and refer topast events, similar to apreterite.Ancient Greek grammar had the aorist form, and the grammars of otherIndo-European languages and languages influenced by the Indo-European grammatical tradition, such asMiddle Persian,Sanskrit,Armenian, theSouth Slavic languages,Georgian,Pontic Greek, andPashto, also have forms referred to as aorist.
The word comes fromAncient Greekἀόριστος (aóristos'indefinite'),[2][3] as the aorist was theunmarked (default) form of the verb, and thus did not have the implications of theimperfective aspect, which referred to an ongoing or repeated situation, or theperfect, which referred to a situation with a continuing relevance; instead it described an action "pure and simple".[4]
Because the aorist was the unmarked aspect in Ancient Greek, the term is sometimes applied to unmarked verb forms in other languages, such as thehabitual aspect inTurkish.[5]
InProto-Indo-European, the aorist appears to have originated as a series of verb forms expressingmanner of action.[6] Proto-Indo-European had a three-way aspectual opposition, traditionally called "present", "aorist", and "perfect", which are thought to have been, respectively,imperfective,perfective, andstative (resultant state) aspects. By the time of Classical Greek, this system was maintained largely in independent instances of the non-indicative moods and in the nonfinite forms. But in the indicative, and in dependent clauses with thesubjunctive andoptative, the aspects took on temporal significance. In this manner, the aorist was often used as an unmarked past tense, and the perfect came to develop aresultative use,[7] which is why the termperfect is used for this meaning in modern languages.
Other Indo-European languages lost the aorist entirely. In the development of Latin, for example, the aorist merged with the perfect.[8] Thepreterites (past perfectives) of the Romance languages, which are sometimes called "aorist", are an independent development.
InAncient Greek, theindicative aorist is one of the two main forms used in telling a story; it is used for undivided events, such as the individual steps in a continuous process (narrative aorist); it is also used for events that took place before the story itself (past-within-past). The aorist indicative is also used to express things that happen in general, without asserting a time (the "gnomic aorist"). It can also be used of present and future[9] events; the aorist also has several specialized senses meaning present action.
Non-indicative forms of the aorist (subjunctives, optatives, imperatives, infinitives) are usually purely aspectual, with certain exceptions includingindirect speech constructions and the use of optative as part of thesequence of tenses in dependent clauses. There are aorist infinitives and imperatives that do not imply temporality at all. For example, theLord's Prayer in Matthew 6:11 uses the aorist imperative in "Give (δόςdós) usthis day our daily bread",[10] in contrast to the analogous passage in Luke 11:3, which uses theimperfective aspect, implying repetition, with "Give (δίδουdídou, present imperative) usday by day our daily bread."[11]
An example of how the aorist tense contrasts with the imperfect in describing the past occurs inXenophon'sAnabasis, when the Persian aristocrat Orontas is executed: "and those whohad been previously in the habit of bowing (προσεκύνουνprosekúnoun, imperfect) to him,bowed (προσεκύνησανprosekúnēsan, aorist) to him even then."[12] Here the imperfect refers to a past habitual or repeated act, and the aorist to a single one.
There is disagreement as to which functions of the Greek aorist are inherent within it. Some of the disagreement applies to the history of the development of the various functions and forms. Most grammarians differentiate the aorist indicative from the non-indicative aorists. Many authors hold that the aorist tends to be about the past because it is perfective, and perfectives tend to describe completed actions;[13] others that the aorist indicative and to some extent the participle is essentially a mixture ofpast tense and perfective aspect.[14]
Because the aorist was not maintained in either Latin or the Germanic languages, there have long been difficulties in translating the GreekNew Testament into Western languages. The aorist has often been interpreted as making a strong statement about the aspect or even the time of an event, when, in fact, due to its being theunmarked (default) form of the Greek verb, such implications are often left to context. Thus, within New Testamenthermeneutics, it is considered anexegeticalfallacy to attach undue significance to uses of the aorist.[15] 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."[15] In particular, the aorist does not imply a "once-for-all" action, as it has commonly been misinterpreted, although it frequently refers to a simple, non-repeated action.[16]
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 theRāmāyaṇa, 8 times in theHitopadeśa, 6 times in theBhagavad-Gītā, and 6 times in the story ofŚakuntalā in theMahābhārata.[17]
In the later language, the aorist indicative had the value of apreterite,[clarification needed] while in the older language it was closer in sense to the perfect.[17] The aorist was also used with the ancientinjunctive mood, particularly in prohibitions.[18]
The Indo-European aorist was inherited by theSlavic languages but has survived intact only in theSouth Slavic languages. It retains its function entirely in theEastern South Slavic languages,Bulgarian andMacedonian. However, inWestern South Slavic languages it has become, along with theimperfect andpluperfect, largely obsolete in daily parlance and mostly superseded by theperfect andcircumlocution. The aorist is part of thestandardized varieties ofSerbo-Croatian but is no longer part of standardSlovene. In both languages, the aorist appears mostly in older literature, scripture, religious services and legislation and so carries an archaic tone. In Serbo-Croatian, aorist finds natural use only in certain locales while it is completely supplanted by the perfect in others. As such, its use in formal settings can be construed as either pretentious and bombastic or conversely as rustic and unsophisticated, depending on locale. Its disuse does not cause ambiguity, as Slavic verbs have distinctgrammatical aspects to convey related yet distinct meaning.
In modern forms of communication, the aorist has experienced something of a revival among younger speakers in Serbia, as its forms are simpler and shorter to type out than the perfect.[19]
In Bulgarian, which has produced a new regular formation, the aorist is used inindirect and in presumptive quotations.[20] Bulgarian has separate inflections for aorist (past imperfective) and general perfective. The aorist may be used with the imperfective to produce a compoundperfective–imperfective aspect.[21][22]
The aorist in Macedonian is called the "past definite complete tense" (минато определено свршено време) and refers to a completed action in the past tense. It most often corresponds to the simple past tense in English:I read the book, I wrote the letter, I ate my supper, etc. In contemporary standard Macedonian, the aorist is formed almost exclusively from perfective verbs. The formation of the aorist for most verbs is not complex, but there are numerous small subcategories that must be learned. All verbs in the aorist (exceptсум) take the same endings, but there are complexities in the aorist stem vowel and possible consonant alternations. All verbs (exceptсум) take the following endings in the aorist:[23]
| јас -в | ние -вме |
| ти -∅ / -ше | вие -вте |
| тој -∅ / -ше | тие -а / -ја |
(The sign ∅ indicates a zero ending: nothing is added after the stem vowel.)
In theIndo-European languagesGreek andSanskrit, the aoriststem is marked by several morphological devices (the aorist indicative also has the past-tenseaugmentἐ-e-, whichcontracts with the initialvowel). Three aorist morphological devices stand out as most common:
| Morphology | Description, examples of aorist tense and aorist imperative |
|---|---|
| suffixing ofs[24] | The first, weak,s-, orsigmatic aorist is the most common in Greek.
|
| zero-grade ofablaut, lack of suffix /nasal infix[25][26] | The second or strong aorist uses the bareroot of the verb without thee of ablaut or the present-tense suffix or nasal infix. |
| reduplication[27][28] | Reduplication is more common in the perfect, but a few Greek verbs use it in the aorist. The reduplicated aorist is more common inSanskrit, e.g.ájījanam "I gave birth."[17]
|
InGeorgian andSvan, the aorist marks perfective aspect. In the indicative, it marks completed events. In other moods, it marks events that are yet to be completed.[29]
InMingrelian andLaz, the aorist is basically a past tense and can be combined with both perfective and imperfective aspects as well as the imperative and the subjunctive moods.[30]
InKhinalug, the aorist is a perfective aspect, and the two terms ("aorist" and "perfective") are often used interchangeably.[31]
InUdi, the aorist is an imperfective aspect that is usually a past tense but can also replace the present tense.[32]
InTurkish, the aorist (Turkish:geniş zaman, literally "broad time") is ahabitual aspect[5] and is similar to the Englishpresent simple.[33] For example, the statementEt yemem ("I do not eat meat") informs the listener that the speaker is a vegetarian and not merely that they happen not to be eating meat at that very moment. To convey the latter message, thepresent progressiveEt yemiyorum ("I am not eating meat") would be appropriate. The Turkish aorist is commonly used in enquiries about someone's wishes, as inBir şey yemek ister misiniz? ("Would you like to eat something?"). That makes a question likeDomuz eti yer misiniz? ambiguous, as the listener may interpret it as an informational question ("Are you someone who eats pork"?) or as an offer ("Would you [like to] eat pork?").[33]
InJ. R. R. Tolkien'sconstructed languageQuenya, the aorist is agnomic tense orsimple present that expresses general facts or simple present actions.[34]
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