How to Read “You may steal possessions, but you cannot steal character”
monodane wa nusumu tomo hitodane wa nusumarazu
Meaning of “You may steal possessions, but you cannot steal character”
This proverb teaches that while property and possessions can be stolen, a person’s qualities, talents, and skills cannot be taken away.
No matter how valuable an item is, it exists outside of you. It can be lost to theft or disaster.
However, the skills you’ve refined over years, the knowledge you’ve accumulated, and the character you’ve developed are inner values. No one can steal these from you.
People use this proverb to encourage someone facing material loss. It also teaches what truly matters in life.
For example, you might say this to someone who lost their fortune in a failed business. It reminds them that their experience and abilities remain intact.
People also use it to teach young people an important lesson. It shows them that investing in personal growth matters more than accumulating visible wealth.
In modern times, intangible assets are becoming increasingly valuable. This proverb asks us to consider what true wealth really means.
Origin and Etymology
The exact first appearance of this proverb in literature is unclear. However, the structure of the words offers interesting insights.
Notice the contrasting terms “monodane” (seed of things) and “hitodane” (seed of person). This contrast is worth examining.
“Monodane” refers to the source of wealth and goods. It means seed money or capital.
“Hitodane” today often refers to ethnicity. But in ancient times, it meant “human seed” – the essence of a person, their qualities and talents.
This contrasting structure itself reveals the core message of the proverb.
This teaching likely gained importance during the Edo period merchant culture. Merchants knew a practical truth: even if you lose your fortune in business, you can rebuild.
With the skills, wisdom, and connections you’ve built, recovery is possible. Many merchants who lost their shops to fire succeeded again using their skills and reputation.
Craftsmen held a similar belief. Tools can be stolen, but the skills gained through years of training cannot be taken.
This conviction supported the pride of craftsmen. The proverb captures Japanese wisdom about distinguishing between tangible and intangible value.
Usage Examples
- The company went bankrupt and I lost everything, but “you may steal possessions, but you cannot steal character” – with this experience and skill, I will surely recover
- A craftsman who lost his shop to disaster recovered with the spirit of “you may steal possessions, but you cannot steal character” and now his business thrives more than before
Universal Wisdom
This proverb has been passed down because it addresses our instinctive “fear of loss.” It also tackles the eternal question: what has true value?
We seek comfort in visible things. Money, houses, status – these certainly support our lives. But we also carry anxiety that we might lose them someday.
Our ancestors found an answer to this anxiety. They discovered that truly valuable things exist where we cannot see them.
Skills can only be gained through repeated practice. Wisdom comes only through experience. Character is polished only through daily choices.
These accumulate inside you over time. That’s precisely why no one can steal them.
Humans are fragile beings. If we depend too much on things that external factors can take away, we cannot recover when we lose them.
But if you build solid value within yourself, you can rise again from any difficulty. This wisdom may have been humanity’s shared survival strategy for navigating an uncertain world.
The proverb quietly yet powerfully teaches the importance of balancing material and spiritual wealth.
When AI Hears This
The act of stealing an object allows for “perfect copying” in information theory terms. If you steal a gold coin, the value information it holds transfers 100 percent.
This happens because the information has low entropy. The state can be completely described. A gold coin’s essence can be reproduced with just numerical data: purity, weight, and shape.
However, human values and ways of living – what this proverb calls “hitodane” – have a completely different information structure.
One person’s beliefs and judgment standards form through countless experiences, emotions, and relationships accumulated since birth. Information theory calls such complex states “high entropy.”
Describing them requires enormous amounts of information. Moreover, that information is deeply interconnected.
For example, if you try to steal someone’s “integrity,” merely imitating their surface behavior won’t capture the essence.
Why is that person honest? What childhood experiences influenced them? What failures did they learn from?
Without all this contextual information, you cannot reproduce the same “integrity.”
This proverb recognized a fundamental truth of information science. Some information can be transferred without context, while other information is deeply embedded in context and cannot be transferred.
The essential value of humans is high-entropy information that cannot be compressed or transferred. That’s exactly why it cannot be stolen.
Lessons for Today
This proverb teaches modern people that investing in yourself is the most reliable way to build assets.
Numbers in your savings account provide comfort. But relying only on that might be dangerous. Economic conditions change and values fluctuate.
However, the skills and knowledge you acquire, and your growth as a person, never decrease in value.
Why not make time today to learn something new? It could be studying for a certification or refining a hobby skill.
You might learn from conversations with others. What matters is the awareness that you’re accumulating something inside yourself.
If you’re feeling down because you lost something, remember this proverb. What you lost may have been truly important.
But the lessons you gained through that experience, the ways you grew – these are treasures no one can steal. And these become the power to take your next step.
True wealth exists within you.
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