ḥeṭ’ · חֵטְא
From a verb used for missing a target or going astray: sin as departure from the mark God sets. See the Judaism note below. Judg 20:16
The Faith
A moral atlas
A Taxonomy
A Taxonomy
of Sin
Sin can be viewed from many directions: where it begins, how grave it is, how it is chosen, whom it wounds, and what habits it forms.
These are overlapping lenses, not separate boxes. One act may be mortal, external, a commission, an offense against neighbor, and the fruit of a capital vice—all at once.
One act
many lenses
Click any lens to jump to that section
ILens oneBy origin›
IILens twoBy gravity›
IIILens threeMode of performance›
IVLens fourInterior or exterior›
VLens fiveCapital patterns›
VILens sixCooperation›
New to this? Start with the taxonomy. Ready to reflect? Begin your examination.
Before entering the atlas
The map serves mercy.
The Church names sin precisely not to encourage scrupulosity, but to help the conscience see truthfully and return confidently to grace. Objective disorder and personal culpability are related, but they are not identical. CCC 1849–1860
One act, many lenses
A deliberate calumny
Suppose a person knowingly tells a damaging lie about a neighbor. The act does not enter only one compartment; the whole atlas can be laid over it.
- OriginIt is an actual sin: a personal act proceeding from the will.
- GravityIts gravity depends upon the harm, knowledge, and consent; serious injury to another's reputation can be grave matter.
- PerformanceIt is a sin of commission: something forbidden is done.
- ExpressionIt moves from internal intention into an external sin of word.
- ObjectIt is directed against one's neighbor, violating truth and justice.
- PatternRepeated calumny can harden into a vice and make further sins easier.
Twelve intersecting lenses
Explore the atlas
12 folios shown
Whence?Folio 01
How grave?Folios 02, 07, 08
How done?Folios 03–05
Against whom?Folio 09
What pattern?Folios 06, 11, 12
Whose act?Folio 10
Before Folio I
What the word means
“Missing the mark” is not a gentle synonym for imperfection. The mark missed is the true end of human life—communion with God—and therefore sin requires not merely improvement, but atonement and forgiveness.
hamartia · ἁμαρτία
The New Testament's ordinary word for sin, likewise carrying the sense of failing or missing the mark—the end for which the human person was made. Rom 3:23
peccatum
The word that became standard in the Latin West and stands behind much of its precise moral and juridical vocabulary.
St. Augustine
Sin is “a word, deed, or desire contrary to the eternal law.”
The Catechism
CCC 1849–1850
Sin is an offense against reason, truth, and right conscience; a failure in genuine love for God and neighbor; and, finally, an offense against God Himself.
The name reveals the mission
Savior—from what?
“Jesus” is His proper name; “Savior”—Greek Sōtēr—is His title. The name comes through Greek Iēsous from the Hebrew and Aramaic Yēšūaʿ, a form of Joshua, and means “the Lord saves” or “God saves.” The title tells who He is; the name announces what God does. The angel does not leave that salvation undefined: CCC 430
“You are to name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”
Matthew 1:21
He came not merely to improve conduct, relieve earthly suffering, or rescue humanity from sin's consequences while leaving sin itself untouched. He came to free sinners from guilt, estrangement from God, slavery to disordered desire, and the death to which sin leads. He is the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world, the Son of Man who seeks and saves the lost, and the Christ who came into the world to save sinners. Jn 1:29 Lk 19:10 1 Tim 1:15
The atlas below names the enemy from which Jesus saves. The sacramental section that follows shows how His victory reaches the sinner here and now. CCC 430–432
01 By originInherited condition or personal act?
The sin inherited from the Fall. Originating original sin (peccatum originale originans) is Adam's actual transgression; originated original sin (peccatum originale originatum) is the fallen state inherited by each human person—the deprivation of original holiness, not a personal act. CCC 404–405
Any sin personally committed through one's own free act. Every remaining distinction on this page can classify actual sin from a different angle. CCC 1849–1851
Related, but distinct: Concupiscence is the disordered inclination toward sin that remains even after Baptism. It is a consequence of sin, not itself a sin. CCC 1264
02 By gravityMortal or venial?
1Grave matter
+
2Full knowledge
+
3Deliberate consent
Destroys charity in the soul and, if unrepented, separates the person from God. All three conditions above must be present together. CCC 1855–1861
Wounds charity without destroying it. It involves light matter, or grave matter without full knowledge or complete consent. CCC 1862–1863
A necessary distinction: Grave matter alone does not establish that a person has committed a mortal sin; knowledge and consent must also be considered.
Scriptural foundationSt. John distinguishes “sin that leads to death” from “sin that does not lead to death,” while affirming that “all wrongdoing is sin.” The tradition develops this biblical distinction as mortal and venial sin.
1 John 5:16–17 · CCC 1854
03 By mode of performanceCommission or omission?
Doing what is forbidden: for example, stealing or lying. CCC 1853
Failing to do what is obligatory: for example, neglecting someone in grave need or failing a binding duty. CCC 1853
Scriptural foundation“For one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, it is a sin.”
James 4:17
04 By manner of expressionThought, desire, word, or deed?
ThoughtDesireWordDeed
The tradition, reflected in the Confiteor, distinguishes sins according to the way the will's disorder is entertained or expressed. CCC 1853
Deliberate pleasure in a sinful thought.
Rejoicing over a past sin.
Desire for a future sin.
05 By interior knowledge and outward expressionInternal, external, formal, or material?
Axis A · Where the disorder is expressed
Internal sinThe disorder remains in thought, desire, or will.
External sinThe inward choice is expressed in outward word or action. CCC 1853
Axis B · Whether personal culpability attaches
Formal sinAn objectively wrong act done with the knowledge and consent that make it personally culpable.
Material sinAn objectively wrong act done without the knowledge or full consent that would make it personally culpable—ignorance being the paradigm case. The act remains disordered; the person may not be guilty. CCC 1857–1860
Could not reasonably have been overcome; it removes personal imputability. CCC 1793
Could and should have been overcome; negligence may diminish responsibility without removing it. CCC 1791–1792
Deliberately cultivated to avoid moral knowledge; this does not excuse and can increase guilt. CCC 1860
06 The capital sinsWhat vices generate other sins?
They are called capital—from caput, “head”—not because each is necessarily mortal, but because these source-vices engender other sins. Gregory the Great fixed the list of seven; earlier lists associated with Evagrius and Cassian had eight, including vainglory and dejection. CCC 1865–1866
07 Sins against the Holy SpiritHow can mercy itself be refused?
Traditionally called “unforgivable” in reference to Matthew 12:31—not because God's mercy has limits, but because these dispositions refuse the mercy by which sin is forgiven. Mt 12:31–32 · CCC 1864
- Despair of salvation
- Presumption of God's mercy
- Impugning the known truth
- Envy of another's spiritual good
- Obstinacy in sin
- Final impenitence
08 Sins that cry to HeavenWhich injustices does Scripture depict as crying out?
09 By object offendedAgainst God, neighbor, or self?
A common Augustinian and Thomistic division identifies the good directly violated. It maps roughly onto the two tables of the Decalogue. CCC 1849–1853
Blasphemy, sacrilege, idolatry.
Murder, theft, calumny.
Drunkenness, self-destruction, sloth regarding one's own good.
10 Cooperation in another's sinCan one sin through another's act?
The traditional nine ways of being accessory specify common forms of direct and voluntary cooperation. CCC 1868
CounselCommandConsentProvocationPraise or flatteryConcealmentPartakingSilenceDefense of the ill done
Sharing the wrongdoer's sinful intention. This is always wrong.
Contributing without sharing the intention. This may sometimes be permissible depending on proximity and a proportionate reason. CCC 1868
Scandal: leading another into sin by word, act, or omission. Because scandal makes another's fall an object of one's own action or negligence, it belongs beside cooperation. CCC 2284–2287
11 By habituationIs it an act, a vice, or an occasion?
Sinful actAn individual disordered choice. CCC 1850
ViceA habitual disposition toward sin formed by repeated acts—the corruption of virtue at the level of character. CCC 1865
Near occasion of sinA circumstance that is not sinful in itself but foreseeably leads to sin, and which one may therefore be obliged to avoid. CCC 2846–2849
The purpose of the map
Naming sin is not enough.
Atonement and the Sacrament Christ institutedA taxonomy can identify the wound. Only Christ can heal it—and He chose to apply that healing through a sacrament entrusted to His Church.
The sacrament instituted
The first evening of the Resurrection
On Easter evening, in His first appearance to the assembled disciples, the risen Christ joined His peace and mission to a concrete authority: “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.” The first ecclesial gift bound to the Resurrection mission was thus a ministry of peace and forgiveness. Jn 20:19–23 · CCC 1441–1442
This authority completes the power of binding and loosing promised to Peter and the apostles. When Jesus forgave the paralytic, the crowd glorified God for having “given such authority to human beings”; after the Resurrection, He formally entrusted that ministry to His Church. Mt 16:19 Mt 18:18 Mt 9:8
The sacrifice that truly cleanses
Old Covenant
A sign and foreshadowing
fulfilled in
New Covenant
The one definitive sacrifice
Not the blood of goats and calves, but His own.
The sacrifices of the Old Covenant were holy signs appointed by God. They purified ritually, renewed the covenant’s worship, and taught Israel that sin requires atonement. Yet they remained shadows of the definitive sacrifice: repeated animal offerings could not by their own power take away sin or perfect the conscience.
Blood was offered repeatedly. It marked covenant purification and pointed beyond itself, but could not accomplish eternal redemption.
Christ entered once for all with His own Blood, cleansing the conscience and opening communion with God.
This does not mean that God withheld mercy from the righteous who lived before Christ. The Letter to the Hebrews says that Christ’s death brought deliverance even from transgressions committed under the first covenant. Their forgiveness, like ours, rests finally upon the one sacrifice of the Lamb, whose saving power reaches across history. Heb 9:11–15 Heb 10:1–14
The Blood of Christ does not merely cover over an external record. Because it is the self-offering of the incarnate Son, it obtains eternal redemption, washes away iniquity, cleanses the conscience from dead works, and makes the sinner inwardly just by grace. Christ’s sacrifice completes and surpasses every earlier sacrifice; His Blood is the instrument of atonement for the sins of all. CCC 613–615 CCC 1992 1 Jn 1:7–9
Why a sacrament, not a private transaction
Forgiveness was entrusted to men.
Christ did not merely announce that God forgives; He delegated a ministry that forgives or retains. For that ministry to be exercised, grave sins must be disclosed. The Church therefore requires all known mortal sins to be confessed after diligent examination, specifying their kind and number. CCC 1455–1456 · Trent XIV
A forgotten sin is not a concealed sin: what was honestly forgotten is included in absolution and should be mentioned when later remembered. But a vague admission—“I have sinned”—cannot replace integral confession of known grave sins. Deliberately concealing a known mortal sin invalidates the confession and leaves that grave sin unforgiven. The priest exercises judgment upon what the penitent truthfully lays before Christ in the sacrament. CCC 1456, 1461
Plainly stated
Private prayer for forgiveness is necessary and good. It is not a substitute for sacramental confession when a Catholic is conscious of mortal sin. CCC 1446, 1457
The three acts of the penitent
Contrition
Confession
Satisfaction
Contrition. Confession. Satisfaction.
Sorrow for sin and a resolution not to sin again—the first movement of return.
Truthful self-accusation before the priest, without disguise or deliberate omission.
The penance that begins to repair the harm caused by sin and restores habits of justice and charity.
Absolution remits the guilt of sin and restores communion with God; for mortal sin, it rescues the penitent from eternal punishment. Yet temporal punishment and concrete damage may remain. Satisfaction matters because forgiven persons still owe repair, purification, and the healing of sin's consequences—through penance here or purification after death. CCC 1450, 1459–1460 CCC 1472–1473
The juridical image
“Until you have paid the last penny.”
“Settle with your opponent quickly … you will not be released until you have paid the last penny.”
Matthew 5:25–26
Early Christian writers applied the prison and the final payment to purification beyond death; Tertullian is among the earliest witnesses to read the “last farthing” in this postmortem key. The Church names the final purification of those who die in God's grace and friendship, but are not yet perfectly purified, purgatory. Tertullian, De Anima 58 CCC 1030–1031 The Last Farthing
Christ also warns that an account will be rendered “for every careless word.” Sin has a moral ledger: nothing is beneath truth, and nothing is beyond mercy when honestly repented. Deliberately generalizing or concealing mortal sin can leave a person outside sanctifying grace because the sacrament has been invalidly received; sins forgiven but insufficiently repaired can prolong the purification still owed. Mt 12:36 CCC 1456, 1459
The pastoral close
The ledger is settled by mercy.
Precision serves mercy. The confessional is not an audit to fear, but the place Christ appointed for the account to be brought into the light and settled now, freely, by His blood. Accountability and scrupulosity are opposites: accountability tells the truth and trusts the remedy; scrupulosity distrusts mercy and circles endlessly around the self. 1 Jn 1:7–9
The Church therefore urges careful examination without anxious self-invention, honest confession without euphemism, and confidence in absolution once it is given. “There will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents.” Lk 15:7 CCC 1468–1470
A wider vocabulary
Eastern Orthodoxy
Protestant traditions
Judaism
Islam
Other traditions, briefly
The Catholic taxonomy is unusually systematic. Other traditions emphasize different inheritances, metaphors, and divisions.
Speaks of ancestral sin: humanity inherits mortality and corruption from the Fall, but not Adam's personal guilt. It generally favors the image of sin as illness to be healed over the mortal–venial juridical framework.
Most Protestant communities retained the truth that every sin is forgivable in Christ, but set aside the sacramental tribunal entrusted in John 20, replacing obligatory auricular confession and priestly absolution with direct private confession to God. With that change, the Catholic categories of sacramental satisfaction, temporal punishment, and purgatory were largely rejected. Lutheran and Anglican traditions, however, retain forms of individual confession and absolution. Compare the Catholic account above.
Distinguishes chet, an unintentional missing of the mark; avon, knowing transgression arising from desire; and pesha, deliberate rebellion.
Divides sins into saghā'ir, minor sins, and kabā'ir, major sins such as murder and usury. Shirk—associating partners with God—is held to be unforgivable if unrepented at death.