What is a sinner?

 Puritan Society as a whole is the main influence of the moral punishment of Heter Prynne, the main character of the Scarlet Letter.  It is guilty for imbuing the people with what they perceive as right and wrong.  To truly understand morality and ethics we must seek deeper meanings.  In a book called “Ethics: Approaching Moral Decisions,” by Arthur Holmes, these philosophical ideas are defined.  "Ethics is about the good (that is, what values and virtues we should cultivate) and about the right (that is, what our moral duties may be).”⁶ When relating this passage in coherency with the world’s view of morality, it is understandable that one could conclude that all people have “sinned”.  Humans also have a tendency to learn from their mistakes.  This is seen nearly every day. It is what makes the world a safer and more unified place. 

Now once the reader visualizes that everyone has sinned in some way, that individual should feel that the treatment of Hester Prynne is wrong.

“This woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die. Is there not law for it? Truly, there is, both in the Scripture and the statute-book. Then let the magistrates, who have made it of no effect, thank themselves if their own wives and daughters go astray!” cried another female.⁴

 The way the society around Hester responded to the marking of the “A” was not morally right, especially in the Puritan times.  True, Puritan society was based on strict moral codes with punishments acceptable by law; however, it is hypocritical how so many who had sinned before, verbally and emotionally attacked Hester.  In the Gospel of John, Jesus finds himself among a crowd of people ready to stone an adulterer, yet waiting for his recognition of the act. On the contrary, Jesus responds with a verse, “He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first.” (New King James Version, John 8. 7).  With the Puritan society based on Christian belief, and their laws formed under the Church, the people that inflicted remorse upon Hester would be guilty by what should be their own moral terms.  About Hester’s scarlet letter, the people thought,

“Here, there was the taint of deepest sin in the most sacred quality of human life, working such effect, that the world was only the darker for this woman’s beauty, and the more lost for the infant that she had borne.” ⁵