Many translators will identify he as “Jesus” and him as “the Pharisee.” Another option is to do what Good News Translation has done: “Jesus answered.”
You shall love can be three very difficult words to translate. In the first place, the sentence is a command, but translators sometimes have to decide between the singular and plural forms. It is singular in the Greek text, and some translators will use that form also, but it seems clear that the command is being given to the people of Israel, so that the plural form may in fact be better. The normal form for a command should be used, possibly “You must love” or simply “Love.”
As a second problem, love is often difficult since it contains the elements of affection or liking as well as devotion and commitment to. Translators should find a word or expression that contains both of these ideas.
In the Old Testament the Lord was a term that replaced the name of God. However, it would not be appropriate to use that name here, since the Greek text did follow the custom of using “the Lord.” Your God, as in verse 32, can be translated as “the God you worship.” Thus the Lord your God can be translated “the Lord, who is the God you worship.”
The Scripture which Jesus quotes is Deuteronomy 6.5. Matthew employs three terms (heart … soul … mind), while four appear in Mark 12.30 (“heart … soul … mind … strength”). The difference may be accounted for on the assumption that Mark combined the readings of two manuscripts of the Septuagint, while Matthew had a preference for the three-membered form of the Hebrew text. In either case no distinction may be drawn between the meanings of the individual terms. In Hebrew thought a person is not divided into various compartments, as is traditionally done in Greek philosophy, and together these terms summarize the totality of what a person really is. As one scholar notes: “Any one of them would have been sufficient (in terms of Hebrew anthropology) to denote the entirety of a man.” The words of Jesus may be effectively translated “You must love the Lord your God in all that you think or feel or do.” However, if translators do have some means of using two or three different words, as in the text, this may give the sentence some of the emphasis of the original. An example is “Love the Lord your God with all your strength and all your thinking.” Another possibility is “Love the Lord your God completely.”
Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on the Gospel of Matthew. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1988. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .