In Greek the first part of this verse is stated in the abstract (literally “love does not do wrong to the fellow-man”), but it is removed from the abstract by the Good News Translation. It is obvious that “love” refers to “the person who loves,” and so the Good News Translation makes this specific: Whoever loves his fellow-man will never do him wrong.

The last part of this verse literally reads “love is the fulfilling of the Law.” As in verse 8, the Good News Translation here takes “fulfilling” in the sense of “obeying” and the Law as a reference to the Jewish Law. The nouns “love” and “fulfilling” are rendered as infinitives: to love and to obey. The relations between to love and to obey may be variously expressed as means-result and condition-result—for example, “By loving one’s neighbors, one obeys the whole Law” or “If one loves one’s neighbors, one obeys the whole Law.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on Paul’s Letter to the Romans. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1973. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .