The aorist

The first verb of John 3:16

For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son

John 3:16

"Loved" is ἠγάπησεν ("ēgapēsen"). The 원어 panel labels it aorist, active, indicative, 3rd, singular. The aorist is the most common past tense in the stories and statements of the New Testament, and the next verb, ἔδωκεν ("edōken"), "He gave", is aorist too.

Remember from the verb-system lesson that a Greek tense says how an action is viewed, not only when it happened. The imperfect shows an action in progress or repeated. The aorist presents it as a whole, like a snapshot. In the indicative this usually reads as a simple past: "he loved", "he gave". It does not, by itself, mean "once and for all". If a passage stresses finality, that comes from the context, not from the tense. As a rule of thumb: an aorist indicative is usually "did".

The 1st aorist: augment plus -σα-

Aorists come in two shapes. The regular one, called the 1st aorist, puts the augment (the ε- you saw in the imperfect) in front of the stem, adds σα after it, and then the endings. In ἠγάπησεν the first vowel α has been lengthened to η by the augment, and -σεν follows.

Learn the 3rd singular -σεν and 3rd plural -σαν first; they are the ones you will meet constantly. John 2:11 sums up the sign at Cana with three of them: ἐποίησεν "did", ἐφανέρωσεν "revealed", and ἐπίστευσαν ("episteusan") "believed".

First John 1:1 has ἐψηλάφησαν, "handled", built the same way. One small note: ἔδωκεν has a κ where we expect σ, but the panel still calls it simply aorist. So the σ is the common marker, not the only one.

The 2nd aorist: a changed stem

Some of the most common verbs do not add σα. Their stem itself changes, and they take endings like the imperfect's: -ον, -ες, -ε(ν), -ομεν, -ετε, -ον. The panel calls these the 2nd aorist. The "2nd" names a form, not a different meaning. It is an aorist, and it reads "did", just like the 1st.

Almost every word in this lesson's vocabulary is of this kind, apart from ἀγαπάω "love". εἶπεν ("eipen") "said" belongs to εἶπον, which occurs more than 900 times in the New Testament. ἔλαβον ("elabon") "received" is the "as many as received Him" of John 1:12. κατέλαβεν, from the same stem with κατα- in front, is what the darkness did not do to the light; as in the imperfect, the augment goes after the prefix (κατ-έ-λαβεν). The aorist of ἔρχομαι "come" is ἦλθεν ("ēlthen"), "he came", and that of ἀποθνήσκω "die" is ἀπέθανεν ("apethanen"). It carries the gospel itself: "Christ died for our sins" 1 Corinthians 15:3.

Reading aorist next to imperfect

In a narrative the two tenses often sit side by side. In John 1:39 the two disciples ἦλθαν "went", εἶδαν "saw" and ἔμειναν "stayed": events carry the story forward. Then ἦν "it was" (about the tenth hour) is imperfect, setting the scene behind them. A change of tense can tell you whether the writer is moving the plot or painting the background. This is a tendency, not a law.

The verse also has two small surprises. ἦλθαν and εἶδαν are 2nd aorists ending in -αν instead of -ον: in New Testament Greek, 2nd aorists sometimes borrow the 1st aorist's endings, and the panel still calls them 2nd aorist. And ἔμειναν is a 1st aorist without σ: verbs whose stem ends in λ, μ, ν or ρ, like μένω, add only the -α-.

Finding the dictionary form

A 2nd aorist can look very different from its present, so the lexicon form matters. The dictionary lists εἶπον as an entry of its own, and the aorist of εἴδω "see", εἶδον (as in εἶδαν), likewise. The infinitive ἰδεῖν "to see" in John 3:3 uses the same stem. When a form looks unfamiliar, trust the panel's lexicon form and its "2nd aorist" label.

Why it matters

The main line of events in the Gospels and Acts is mostly carried by aorist indicatives. When you open the 원어 panel on a story and see "aorist, active, indicative" again and again, you are looking at the main line of events: he came, he said, they believed. Spotting the aorist helps you see which verbs move the story along, and the translation "did" will almost always serve. You do not need to produce these forms yourself, only to recognise them, and the augment and σα are your first two clues.

Summary

The aorist indicative is usually "did", and it views an action as a whole. The 1st aorist has the augment and -σα- (-σεν, -σαν); the 2nd aorist changes the stem and takes imperfect-like endings. The difference between them is shape, not sense.

Words in this lesson

• εἶπονeiponto say926 times in the NT
• εἴδωeidōto perceive: see340 times in the NT
• ἔρχομαιerchomaito come/go631 times in the NT
• ἀγαπάωagapaōto love143 times in the NT
• ἀποθνήσκωapothnēskōto die111 times in the NT

Practice