They found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name. — There seems at that time to have been a flourishing settlement of Jews in Cyrene, and members of that community appear as prominent in the crowd of the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:10), among the disputants who opposed Stephen (Acts 6:9), and among the active preachers of the Word (Acts 11:20). Why, we ask, out of the whole crowd that was streaming to and fro, on the way to the place of execution, did the multitude seize on him? St. Mark’s mention of him as the father of Alexander and Rufus (see Note on Mark 15:21), suggests the thought that his sons were afterwards prominent as members of the Christian community. May we not infer that he was suspected even then of being a secret disciple, and that this led the people to seize on him, and make him a sharer in the humiliation of his Master? He was coming, St. Mark adds, “out of the country.”
Him they compelled. — The word is the technical term for forced service (see Note on Matthew 5:41). The act implied that our Lord was sinking beneath the burden, and that the soldiers began to fear that He might die before they reached the place of execution.