The aorist is another past tense. While originally the three past tenses – imperfect, perfect and aorist – differed from one another in meaning, this difference does not survive: they come to be used interchangeably, with the aorist being rarest. Its most regular use is after मा to express prohibitions, i.e. negated commands (see below).
There are seven different ways of forming the aorist. They are outlined here for reference purposes, and details (as well as middle forms) may be found e.g. in Whitney, A Sanskrit Grammar (§§824–930). Aorist indicatives of all types use the augment a- and secondary endings (i.e. those also found in the imperfect). They differ in how their stem is formed.
1.a) In the root aorist, augment and endings (1st SG -am) are added to the root, which in different verbs stands in different grades. It is limited to √भू and verbs ending in -ā.
1.b) The a-aorist adds augment and endings to a zero-grade root followed by -a-. Among aorist formations, this one is rather frequent.
2) The reduplicated aorist reduplicates the root-initial consonant according to the known patterns, and vowels as follows: i is reduplicated as i/ī, u as u/ū, and a and ṛ as either i/ī or, more rarely, a/ā. (If the root syllable is light (i.e. contains a short vowel followed by no more than one consonant), the reduplicative vowel typically is long; if the root syllable is heavy, the reduplicative vowel typically is short.) The root itself stands in guṇa or zero grade, and an -a- is added onto it. This aorist is usually formed of derived verbs (such as causatives).
3) Finally, there are a number of aorists formed by the addition of -s-/-ṣ- (the latter after ruki). Internal sandhi frequently occurs in all aorists of this kind.
a) The s-aorist adds -s- onto the root. If the root ends in a vowel, it usually stands in vṛddhi in the active, and in zero grade in the middle (yet roots ending in -ī/-ū stand in guṇa). If it ends in a consonant, it has vṛddhi in the active, and zero grade in the middle.
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