means The nonphysical essence of a person — the seat of feeling, conscience, and identity often believed to outlast the body.

from From Old English sawol, shared with Old Frisian sele and Old High German sela, all from a Proto-Germanic root sometimes tentatively linked to the sea — the notion, possibly, that souls came from and returned to the water. The English word stretched into music in the 20th century: 'soul' as a genre named the deep, churchgoing feeling that gospel poured into rhythm and blues.