John 13:12-15 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

So after he had washed their feet, &c. After he had given them such a striking proof of his humility, condescension, and love, by performing to them the office of the meanest slave; he said, Know ye what I have done to you? Know ye the meaning of what I have done? for the action was emblematical. Ye call me Master, and Lord Ο διδασκαλος και ο κυριος, the master, or teacher, and the Lord. “The article prefixed to each appellation, and the nominative case employed, where in common language it would have been the accusative, give great energy to the expression, and show that the words are applied to Jesus in a sense entirely peculiar.” Campbell. And ye say well I am really what you call me, being the Son of God, and Saviour of the world, If I, then, your Lord, &c., have washed your feet Have condescended to so mean an office, and in all other instances have shown my readiness in love to serve you; ye also ought to wash one another's feet And why did they not? Why do we not read of any one apostle ever washing the feet of any other? Because they understood their Lord better. They knew he never designed that this should be literally taken. He designed to teach them the great lesson of humble love, as well as to confer inward purity upon them. And hereby he teaches us, 1st, In every possible way to assist each other in attaining that purity. 2d, To wash each other's feet, by performing all sorts of good offices to each other, even those of the lowest kind, when opportunity serves, and the necessity of any calls for them. For I have given you an example that ye should do On all proper occasions to one another; as I have done to you As if he had said, I have set you a pattern of humility, to recommend it to you: and it must be acknowledged that nothing shows us more effectually the necessity of this grace, than its being recommended to us by so high an example; a recommendation which, in the present circumstances, was peculiarly seasonable, for the disciples having heard Jesus say that the kingdom of God was at hand, (Luke 22:18,) their minds were so fired with ambitious passions, that, before they arose from supper, they fell into a hot contention about sharing the principal posts in the kingdom.