sin

Distinctions

chet (חטא)

Root ח-ט-א, whose plain sense is to miss, to lack. Rashi (Melachim I 1:21) reads Batsheva's chataim as "lacking": she and Shlomo would lack the royal standing due them. The Vilna Gaon (Mishlei 1:10, 13:6) builds on that: a chet is a sin of lack, the failure to perform a positive mitzvah. Rabbi Yechezkel Landau joins this to the Gemara: the chet is the failure to do teshuvah after an inadvertent sin. Rabbi Moshe Shapiro keeps the Gemara's shogeg and takes Rashi's "lack" as the lesson: a chet is a missed goal; the sinner falls short of the purpose for which man was made. Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim: chet names the sinner's lack of mindfulness at the moment of the act. Malbim, who takes all three words as deliberate sins differing in motive: chet is the sin of one swayed by bodily desire, who indulges in what he knows is wrong. Peirush HaRokeach: inadvertent, as the Gemara.

avon (עון)

Root ע-ו-ה, crooked. Gemara: the deliberate sin, meizid. Pappenheim: the sin of one who "thinks too much," reasons his way to the conclusion that the sin is right, and acts on it. Malbim: the sin of one whose intellect has been led astray. Peirush HaRokeach departs from the Gemara here: avon is the sin from which one drew physical pleasure or some other benefit.

pesha (פשע)

Root פ-ש-ע. Gemara: the sin of rebellion. Pappenheim: the sinner knows the act is wholly wrong and does it anyway, to rebel against Hashem. Malbim: the same, shameless defiance. Peirush HaRokeach: simply the willful sin (he has moved meizid here, having given avon the sense of benefit).

aveirah (עבירה)

Root ע-ב-ר, to pass over. Not a Biblical word. Rabbinic, once specifically for indecency, now the everyday term for any wrongdoing. Rabbi Yaakov Tzvi Mecklenburg: the sinner "passes over" his own thoughts so as not to look at the ugliness of the deed. The Gemara (Shabbos 40a) calls even one who breaks a Rabbinic prohibition an avaryan, so the word reaches across the Rabbinic line too.

How sharp are the categories? Rambam (Hilchos Teshuvah) codifies the vidui as chatati, aviti, pashati, the Kohen Gadol's formula (Mishnah Yoma 4:2). Rabbi Yosef Babad (Minchas Chinuch): say whichever applies. Rabbi Elazar Menachem Mann Shach: say all three always, because no sin sits cleanly in one box; an inadvertent sin carries traces of wantonness and rebellion, and a rebellious one traces of inadvertence.

Rendering guidance

• The triple, in the vidui or in a pasuk: "sin, iniquity, and rebellious sin" (or as verbs, "I have sinned, I have done iniquity, I have rebelled"). Keep the ascending order; never collapse two of them into "sin."
• Standalone: chet is "sin"; avon is "sin" too (Weil), and "iniquity" only where the text sets it against chet; pesha alone is "rebellious sin" or "willful transgression," so the defiance stays audible.
• Chet is "inadvertent," not "accidental" or "a mistake": the vidui confesses it, and Rabbi Moshe Shapiro reads it as a goal missed.
• Trap: "sin" absorbs all three, and "transgression" is ambiguous between pesha and aveirah. Reserve "transgression" for aveirah; give pesha the word "rebellious."
• Malbim and Peirush HaRokeach re-sort the three (by motive; by benefit). If a derashah turns on their reading, follow it and say so; otherwise the Gemara's shogeg / meizid / mered ladder is the default.

Sources

Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein, "Degrees of Sin," What's in a Word?, Ohr Somayach, 6 Tishrei 5779 (2018-09-15): raw text in sources/whats-in-a-word/raw/7940-degrees-of-sin.md. Primary loci the article cites: Mishnah Yoma 4:2 and Yoma 36b (the Kohen Gadol's confession); Melachim I 1:21 with Rashi; Vilna Gaon to Mishlei 1:10 and 13:6; Rambam, Hilchos Teshuvah (the vidui formula), with Minchas Chinuch and Rav Shach on it; Shabbos 40a (avaryan on a Rabbinic prohibition).