[B-Greek] Fwd: Imperfect and Aorist Tense-Aspects

Elizabeth Kline kline_dekooning at earthlink.net
Mon Sep 18 15:43:11 EDT 2006


On Sep 18, 2006, at 11:02 AM, Elizabeth Kline wrote:

>> On Sep 18, 2006, at 10:08 AM, Kimmo Huovila wrote:
>>> Randall is saying that the aorist is a past
>>> tense and even though in a conditional sentence protasis it does
>>> not signal
>>> past (just as in English), it does not mean that it is not a past
>>> tense (in
>>> other contexts)..
>
> Is there some sort of general agreement that the aorist used in a
> conditional sentence protasis cannot be explained by a shift of
> vantage point? It seems feasable to me that a condional sentance
> might put the protasis semantically in the past so that the temporal
> vantage point of the conditional utterance is in the middle, between
> the protasis and the apodosis.

The location of the vantage point between the protasis and the  
apodosis appears to be improbable, please forget I said that.

My real question is the first part. Can the aorist used in a  
conditional sentence protasis be explained by a shift of vantage  
point? Most now admit that there is no necessary linkage between real  
time and deitic center. So why do we get upset when a conditional  
protasis is located in the past? The hypothetical nature of a  
statement doesn't precluded framing the statement from a past  
temporal vantage point. The choice of vantage point is somewhat  
arbitrary is it not?


Elizabeth Kline







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