Matthew 20:32 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Jesus—said, What will ye, &c.— It is observable, that we never find Jesus bestowing an alms of money on any poor person falling in his way; yet this is no objection against his charity: for if the person who addressed him was incapable of working for his own subsistence by reason of bodily infirmity, it was much more noble, and much more becoming the dignity of the Son of God, to remove the infirmity, and put the beggar in a condition of supporting himself, than by the gift of a small sum to relieve his present want, which would soon return; such an alms being at best but a trifling and indirect method of helping him. On the other hand, if the beggars who applied to him were not in real distress through want or disease, but, under the pretence of infirmity or poverty, followed begging, as they deserved no encouragement, so they met with none from Jesus, who knew perfectly the circumstances of every particular person with whom he conversed. Besides, to have bestowed money on the poor was not only beneath Christ's dignity, but, having occasion to perform great cures on several beggars, it might have afforded his enemies a plausible pretence for affirming, that he bribed such as feigned diseases, to feign cures likewise, of which they gave him the honour. See Macknight.