Why the Soul Is Punished When a Person Sins by Mistake

"When a soul sins by mistake" (Leviticus 4:2). Is it the soul that sins? Scripture says, "In the place of justice, there is wickedness" (Ecclesiastes 3:16) — the place of the soul, which was given out of righteousness, from a place where there is neither iniquity nor sin: is it she who sins? Scripture expresses astonishment: "When a soul sins by mistake!" "The place of righteousness — there is wickedness." To what is the matter comparable? To two people who sinned against the king, one a townsman and one a man of the palace. He saw that both of them had committed one and the same sin. He turned away from the townsman, but against the man of the palace he issued a verdict. The men of his palace said to him: "Both of them committed one and the same sin. From the townsman you turned away, yet against the man of the palace you issued a verdict!" He said to them: "From the townsman I turned away because he does not know the customs of royalty; but the man of the palace is with me every day and knows what the customs of royalty are. And the one who sins against me — what judgment shall go forth upon him?" So too the body is a townsman: "And the Lord God formed the human, dust from the ground" (Genesis 2:7). And the soul is a man of the palace from above: "and He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life" (ibid.). And both of them sin. Why? Because it is impossible for the body to be without the soul; for if there is no soul there is no body, and if there is no body there is no soul. And both of them sin. "The soul that sins, it shall die" (Ezekiel 18:20). Therefore Scripture expresses astonishment: "When a soul sins by mistake." What is "by mistake, from any of the commandments of the Lord"? To teach you that anyone who sins by mistake is [as if] he transgresses against the commandments of the Lord. And so it says, "And when you err and do not perform all these commandments" (Numbers 15:22). [And so David said, "Errors — who can discern them? From hidden faults cleanse me;] also from willful sins hold back Your servant, and I shall be clean of great transgression" (Psalms 19:13–14) — from the great sin that I committed. And if you do so, "let the words of my mouth be acceptable" (ibid. 15). From here you learn that anyone who sins, even by mistake, is called a sinner. Our Rabbis taught: an error in study is reckoned as willful sin. Therefore it is written, "When a soul sins," because she is from above — and it is not written "a person."