Learn German: Manchmal tut ihm die Seele weh.

In the German Mittelfeld (the middle part of the sentence after the conjugated verb), pronouns almost always come before nouns. Because the subject die Seele is a noun and the dative object ihm is a pronoun, ihm jumps in front of the subject. If the subject were also a pronoun, the subject would come first (for example: Manchmal tut es ihm weh).

Why does the German sentence use ihm die Seele instead of seine Seele?

German frequently uses a dative pronoun plus the definite article (die) to show possession of body parts, clothing, or deeply personal things like the mind and soul. While Manchmal tut seine Seele weh is grammatically understandable, using the dative ihm sounds much more natural and idiomatic.

Wait, who is the subject of this sentence? Is it ihm?

The subject is die Seele (the soul), not ihm. In English, we might focus on the person hurting, but in German, the thing that is causing the pain is the grammatical subject doing the action of wehtun, and the person experiencing the pain acts as the dative object (ihm).

Is wehtun always split up like this?