It is general knowledge that even before Jesus, the Jewish Rabbi Hillel gave the “Golden Rule” in its negative form: “Do not do to others what you would not want them to do to you; that is the entire Law, and all else is interpretation.”

The word So would make it appear that this verse is summing up the previous passage. However, this is not the case. The preceding verses have been talking about a person’s relation to God, but this verse talks about people’s relation to each other. Therefore many translations, including Good News Translation, do not put any transition here.

Men is translated “others” by Good News Translation, since the reference is to people in general.

There are several ways to express this “Golden Rule.” For example, translators can say “However you want people to treat you, that’s how you should treat them” or “The things you want people to do to you, do those things first to other people.” The sentence can also be reversed: “Treat other people the way you would like them to treat you.”

For this is the law and the prophets: Jerusalem Bible renders “that is the meaning of the Law and the Prophets,” and New American Bible “this sums up the law and the prophets.” Barclay translates “This is a summary of the message of the Law and the Prophets,” and Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, 1st edition “this is the content of the Law and the teachings of the Prophets.” This can also be expressed as “this is what the Law and the Prophets actually teach” or “this is what the Law and the Prophets say.”

For a discussion of the law and the prophets, see 5.17.

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 .