[B-Greek] Verbal Aspect
John Sanders
john.franklin.sanders at gmail.com
Thu Apr 16 01:41:48 EDT 2009
Donald Dwight on Apr 14th posted a short article titled “Verbal and nominal
aspect of tense.” Without commenting on his presentation, I would also like
to post some thoughts on verbal aspect. There are many ways to slice and
dice language and what I am presenting is not to be thought of as a
scholarly analysis of aspect, but rather as an attempt by one student
attempting to get a handle on aspect.
I have no objection to the usual classifiers (perfective, imperfective,
stative), but they do not particularly help me in grasping the concept. So
in consequence, I use different terms, terms that help clarify in my mind
what I think the terms are suppose to convey. And that may indicate a
problem on my part, perhaps I am misunderstanding the concept completely.
Let me present a simple schema, pretty much in agreement with normal
presentations.
I first work with what I call the first order or level one aspect qualities.
Level or order is just a means for me to keep tract of what I am working
with. This first order consists of the verb stems: present, perfect,
future, and aorist.
I will begin with the present stem. If I am not mistaken, this is often
referred to as perfective. I see, though, that is comes in two flavors, I
will use the Greek word γραφω (GRAFW) and εγραφον (hEGRAFON) as examples of
those two flavors. I assume that these two flavors represent tense, since I
can normally represent the ἐνεστως χρόνος (ENESTWS XRONOS) with the English
present tense and the παρατατικός χρόνος (PARATATIKOS XRONOS) with the
English past tense. But tense, it appears to me, is by way of the endings
(plus the augment in the case of PARATATIKOS XRONOS). So what does the stem
represent? I have not done any statistical analysis, etc., but if I look at
GRAFW as an example, then when GRAFW, I draw out the letters, and by
extension, write something for someone else to read, and by extension
compose something for someone else to read, etc. So to my mind, it appears
that the present stem has the aspect of “doing” or “processing”. So I call
this the “doing aspect” with two flavors, the “present tense” and the “past
tense”.
I have no problem with thinking of the perfect stem as stative, except for
one small issue. There are several verbs of state in Greek that are not in
part of the perfect stem. So to me, this is a specific case of state with
the perfect stem appearing to be similar to the present stem, except for a
phase shift. So when the verb in the “doing aspect” completes its purpose,
or meets its measure, or accomplishes it task, etc., then the perfect stem
represents that state of being. So I would call this the “stative
post-doing aspect.” The perfect stem also comes in two flavors: the
παρακείμενος χρόνος (PARAKEIMENOS XRONOS representing the present tense in
this phase) and the ὑπερσυντέλικος χρόνος (hUPERSUNTELIKOS XRONOS
representing the past tense in this phase). English does not formalize this
aspect nor does it represent this aspect uniformly. Let me present some
examples to clarify my meaning. 1) When GRAFW is complete, the verbal
state of “after completedness” is represented in Greek by γέγραφα (GEGRAFA).
In English we generally represent this concept with the present tense of “to
have” and the past participle, “I had written.” 2) When is ἵστημι (hISTHMI)
is complete, the verbal state of “after completedness” is represented in
Greek by ἕστακα (ἕστηκα) (hESTAKA (Hesthka) In English we generally
represent this concept with the present tense of “to be” plus the present
participle, “I am standing.” 3) Let me present my third example from a
small event from my own history. Once, when I was young, my brother was
explaining something to me. When I understand the situation, I said
something to the effect “I see.” My brother retorted, “so said the blind
man.” “Yes,” I responde, “I was blind, but now I do see.” Once the
“seeing” has been accomplished, once we understand the situation, once we
are enlightened, then we οἶδα (OIDA). We represent this in English with the
verb in the present tense, I know. 4) For my final example, when
ἑτοιμάζω (hTOIMAZW,
I prepare) is completed, the resulting state is represented by
ἡτοίμακα (hHTOIMAKA)
and in English with a verb in the perfect tense, I prepared.
The future aspect is appended to the present stem and the perfect stem. It
completes the tense formulation of past, present future, but instead of
being a third flavor to the present or perfect stem, it makes a compound
stem from those two stems.
The aorist stem represents the state “of occurring, of existence.” I call
this to myself the “existential aspect.” Whereas in the present and perfect
systems past is relative to present, here the existence is “absolute”, that
is it is not relative to anything else, it just exists. Also, in the Greek,
there is no restraint on its association, so that the “existential aspect”
can be used with the past tense, with the present tense, and even with the
future tense (although I suspect this use can be mishandled easily by the
speaker or writer).
Someone a while ago had posted an observation that it appears that in the
GNT the use of the perfect tense was the same as the aorist tense. That may
be the case, but I think something else is happening. I think that the
“stativeness” is breaking down within the PARAKEIMENOS XRONOS. I suspect
that many speakers view that instead of “stativeness” they understand it as
“completedness”, similar to the English perfect tense. It is easy enough to
do, the distinction between the two concepts are close enough so that in
practical usage one can stand for the other in many cases, such as for the
word hHTOIMAKA. I also suspect that later the distinction between
“existentialness” and “completedness” began to be conflated, so that the
aorist tense also carries the idea “completedness” similar to the English
perfect tense. And from there the two tenses began to be conflated and
merged. But I suspect that occurred later that what is usually referred to
as the Koine period.
The five remaining aspects, that represented by the participle, the
infinitive, the imperative, the subjunctive, and the optative are in what I
designate as the second order of aspects. There are all affixed to the four
stems of the first order. So their aspect is compounded to those aspects
upon which they are compounded to. That is why these aspects do not show
any tenseness, except for the future compounds; they are not compounded to
the “flavors” of the present stem or perfect stem, just to the stems
themselves.
One final element. I have presented this in the active voice. All of this
can be replicated in the middle voice. So there is to my mind a zero order,
or primary order of aspect and that is voice. There are two flavors: the
“emphatic” and the “non-emphatic”. The “emphatic” can be in the “active
voice” (middle voice) or in the “passive voice”, and many times it will be
difficult to distinguish one from the other in usage.
As I have presented it here, my first order is nothing more than the
indicative mood. My second order is the other moods, but it is now easier
for me to see why the participle and the infinitive are called moods. Also,
no single verbal form shows only one aspect. The aorist shows two aspects:
voice and existentialism. The other forms show three or four aspects
compounded together.
As always, I am open to criticism and correctin.
--
John Sanders
Suzhou, China
More information about the B-Greek
mailing list