Not (from the Tao Te Ching)

• What is has value. What is not has use.
• Form is valuable. (But/and) emptiness is useful.

Interpretations of the two sides, collaged

• What is / form / being for gain / advantage / value.
• What is not / emptiness / non-being for usefulness.

The two sides

• what is / the tangible / Something / what is / being / what is / form
  • profit / advantages / gain / create / work with / valuable / clever
• what isn’t / intangible / Nothing / what is not / non-being / what is not / emptiness
  • use / useful / put to use / use / what we use / useful / useful

Final lines of the chapter

So the profit in what is
is in the use of what isn’t.

Thus, while the tangible has advantages,
It is the intangible that makes it useful.

Thus what we gain is Something, yet it is by virtue of Nothing that this can be put to use.

Thus do we
create what is
to use what is not.

We work with being,
but non-being is what we use.

What is valuable comes from what is; what is useful comes from what is not.

Therefore form is employed
In order to make things clever;
Emptiness is employed
In order to make them useful.

From my favourite edition, Ursula K. Le Guin’s

11. The Uses of Not

Thirty spokes
meet in the hub.
Where the wheel isn’t
is where it’s useful.

Hollowed out,
clay makes a pot.
Where the pot’s not
is where it’s useful.

Cut doors and windows
to make a room.
Where the room isn’t,
there’s room for you.

So the profit in what is
is in the use of what isn’t.

From other editions I have read

John C. H. Wu

We make a vessel from a lump of clay
It is the empty space within the vessel that makes it useful.

Thus, while the tangible has advantages,
It is the intangible that makes it useful.

D. C. Lau

Knead clay in order to make a vessel. Adapt the nothing therein to the purpose in hand, and you will have the use of the vessel. … Thus what we gain is Something, yet it is by virtue of Nothing that this can be put to use.

Arthur Waley

We turn clay to make a vessel;
But it is on the space where there is nothing that the usefulness of the vessel depends.

Therefore just as we take advantage of what is, we should recognise the usefulness of what is not.

Ralph Alan Dale

We shape clay
to birth a vessel,
yet it’s the hollow within
that makes it useful.

Thus do we
create what is
to use what is not.

From other editions I haven’t read yet

Stephen Mitchell

We shape clay into a pot,
but it is the emptiness inside
that holds whatever we want.

…

We work with being,
but non-being is what we use.

John Patterson

When clay is formed into a pot
the place left empty
makes the pot useful.

…

Yes, what we have may be profitable,
But – what we do not have;
that is also useful.

Ray Grigg

A vessel is shaped from clay but its usefulness comes from the empty space within.

What is valuable comes from what is; what is useful comes from what is not.

Benjamin Hoff

Shape clay into a form.
In order to make a vessel.
In its emptiness–
The cavity inside of it–
Can be found the vessel’s
Usefulness.

Therefore form is employed
In order to make things clever;
Emptiness is employed
In order to make them useful.

Added 2024-11-29.