Lynn's - Daode jing of Laozi

Sincere words are not beautiful.

Honesty [shi] consists of simplicity [ zhi]. (1)

Beautiful words are not sincere.

Fundamentality [ben] consists of the uncarved block [pristine simplicity] [pu].

Those who are good do not engage in disputation; those who engage in disputation are not good. Those who know are not broadly learned;

The ultimate consists of the One. (2)

Those who are broadly learned do not know. (3) The sage is not acquisitive.

He keeps nothing as his own private property. Only this good one can be as giving as this, for he does nothing less than leave others entirely to themselves.

The more he does for others, the more he himself has.

He is honored by others.

The more he gives to others, the more he himself possesses.

It is to him that others gravitate.

The Dao of Heaven is to provide benefit without doing harm.

Its action is always to beget and complete things.

The Dao of the sage is to act without causing contention.

Because his are benefits provided in accordance with Heaven, they do not provoke people to contend with one another.

Text, in Italics above, is Wang Bi's commentary.

The notes below, are from the translator, Richard John Lynn -

(deb's note - "section" is used for verse in these notes.)

(1) Cf. Wang's commentary to section 56, third passage.

(2) Cf. Wang's commentary to section 39, first passage: "One is the beginning of numbers as well as the ultimate number of things".

(3) Cf. section 56, first and second passages.

From Stephen Mitchell - tao te ching - A New English Version

True words aren't eloquent;
eloquent words aren't true.
Wise men don't need to prove their point;
men who need to prove their point aren't wise.

The Master has no possessions.
The more he does for others,
the happier he is.
The more he gives to others,
the wealthier he is.

The Tao nourishes by not forcing.
By not dominating, the Master leads.

From Byron Katie - A Thousand Names For Joy - Living in Harmony with the Way Things Are

The more she does for others,
the happier she is.
The more she gives to others,
the wealthier she is.

Once, standing in front of a large audience, I realized that I didn't ever have to speak again - not then, not ever. I knew that no force on earth could prompt a word from my mouth, that there was nothing to say, and that words were absolutely unnecessary. So I just stood there and waited, fascinated to see what would come next. Finally, after a long silence, someone in the audience asked a question. And I - it - spoke. It was called upon for a response, and its answer met the question. Nobody needed the response; I had nothing to say that people didn't already know in themselves. Yet the response happened. It was necessary. How do I know it was necessary ? Because it happened.

The reason this speaks is because it does. If I thought I was doing it, I wouldn't be such a fool. My only purpose is to do what I'm apparently doing. When I do The Work with someone, my purpose is to sit with that person and ask the questions. If someone asks me a question, my purpose is to give my experience through my answer. I'm an effect of their suffering; there's no cause arising here. The cause is what people would call outside me, and their outside is my inside. When someone talks, I'm a listener. When someone asks, I'm a response.

I understand spiritual teachers who are silent, and this one speaks. It had to go all the way. It had to take all the risks. It wouldn't let any concept of "I shouldn't say anything at all because no words are true" stop it. It says "you and I", and that's where the scam begins.

Just after my experience at the halfway house in 1986, it was difficult for me to say anything. Table was a lie. Bird was a lie. Tree was a lie. Every word separated the world into parts and seemed to teach what didn't exist. I couldn't say the word I without feeling a loss of integrity. Eventually, I found a way of speaking that seemed less untrue. Instead of "I want a glass of water", I would say, "She thinks she wants a glass of water now"; instead of "I'm hungry", I would say, "It thinks it's hungry now". That was as close as I could get to integrity and still be able to communicate. Later, when the communication became more mature, I began to say, "I'm hungry" or "I want a glass of water". This seemed like an incredible act of deceit and courage at the same time. I felt as if, through language, I would be teaching a lie and become lost in the non-existent again. But I used the I because I wanted to join with other people. It was a way of giving myself to them. I surrendered into that language out of love. I will still sometimes refer to myself as she or we or you. I will take on any pronoun, and sometimes it's hard for people to grasp that. I can't see any separation as real.

So it originally appeared as a liar - for love. It would do anything for love, it would say anything. It would die for it, over and over and over. It would sell its peace, if that were possible. It has no caring for itself. It dies for itself; it lives for itself. It will internally join anyone and anything. It will join because it is the other already.

Because it is not attached to words or things, it is free to give you everything it has, everything it is. Everything in the world is like this, constantly giving itself, constantly pouring itself out into the world, as the world. Generosity is our very nature, and when we try to pretend otherwise, when we hold back or give with a motive, it hurts. A motive is just an unquestioned thought. On the other side of our thinking, generosity naturally appears. There's nothing we need to do to achieve it. It's simply what we are.

Dr Dyer's Essay for Verse 81 -

This final verse of the Tao Te Ching provides the closing message of this entire collection of ideas: You came from no-thing-ness. The place of your origination had no things; the place of your return is one of no things. Therefore, Lao-tzu is inviting you to replace the accumulation of more stuff with the celebration of your true essence. Just as nothing is pure Tao in its formlessness, the real you is that same formlessness ... for you are the Tao.

The Tao Te Ching attempts to attract you to a way of being that recognizes nothingness as the Tao - you could call it a God-realized way of being. In this final essay, I've chosen to propose that you access your non-being, Tao self by living without accumulating. This means giving more, arguing less, and releasing your attachment to everything in the world of the 10,000 things. Ultimately, living this way even means letting go of your attachment to your life and your body. But you can practice this right now, while you're still living in the world.

Saint John of the Cross speaks to this way of seeing your life:

To reach satisfaction in all
desire its possession in nothing.
To come to possess all
desire the possession of nothing.
To arrive at being all
desire to be nothing.
To come to the knowledge of all
desire the knowledge of nothing.

All of this wisdom of nothingness comes out of the offerings of Lao-tzu, the ancient spiritual sage who wants us to experience the bliss of being all by knowing a non-accumulating place of no-thing-ness.

It is difficult to imagine a world without things, yet in this final verse of the Tao Te Ching, Lao-tzu takes you through what such a world would look like. You don't need beautiful words, since there is no-thing for you to describe. There is no-thing to argue about, as there are no possessions to fight over. There's no faultfinding or blaming, for all that exists is the hidden virtue of the Tao. And finally, there is no-thing to collect, amass, or accumulate, which leaves you in a state of creative giving and supporting. "Heaven does good", says Lao-tzu, and good is a synonym for God, which is truly the same as the Tao.

Meister Eckhart illustrates the interchangeability of the words God and Tao in this piece:

God is a being beyond being
and a nothingness beyond being.
God is nothing. No thing.
God is nothingness.
And yet God is something.

You're encouraged in this final verse of the enduring and amazing Tao Te Ching to do all that you can to imitate heaven while you're here in form.