Gospel of April 9 2020 with comment

From the Gospel of Jesus Christ according to John 13,1: 15-XNUMX.
Before the feast of Easter, Jesus, knowing that his hour had come to pass from this world to the Father, after having loved his own who were in the world, loved them to the end.
While they were having dinner, when the devil had already put in the heart of Judas Iscariot, son of Simon, to betray him,
Jesus knowing that the Father had given everything to him and that he had come from God and returned to God,
he got up from the table, put down his clothes and, having taken a towel, put it around his waist.
Then he poured water into the basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and dry them with the towel he had girded on.
So he came to Simon Peter and he said to him, "Lord, do you wash my feet?"
Jesus replied: "What I do, you do not understand now, but you will understand later".
Simon Peter said to him, "You will never wash my feet!" Jesus said to him, "If I do not wash you, you will have no part with me."
Simon Peter said to him, "Lord, not only your feet, but also your hands and your head!"
Jesus added: «Whoever has bathed needs only to wash his feet and it is all the world; and you are clean, but not all. "
In fact, he knew who betrayed him; therefore he said, "Not all of you are clean."
So when he had washed their feet and got their clothes, he sat down again and said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you?"
You call me Master and Lord and say well, because I am.
So if I, the Lord and the Master, have washed your feet, you too must wash one another's feet.
In fact, I have given you an example, because as I did, you too ».

Origen (ca 185-253)
priest and theologian

Commentary on John, § 32, 25-35.77-83; SC 385, 199
"If I don't wash you, you won't have a part with me"
"Knowing that the Father had given everything to him and that he had come from God and returned to God, he got up from the table." What was not before in the hands of Jesus is put back by the Father in his hands: not only certain things, but all of them. David said: "Oracle of the Lord to my Lord: Sit at my right hand, until I place your enemies as a stool for your feet" (Ps 109,1: XNUMX). The enemies of Jesus were in fact part of that 'all' that his Father gave him. (…) Because of those who had turned away from God, he who by nature does not want to leave the Father has turned away from God. He came out of God so that what had gone away from him would return with him, that is, in his hands, with God, according to his eternal plan. (...)

So what did Jesus do by washing the feet of his disciples? Didn't Jesus make their feet beautiful by washing and drying them with the towel he was wearing, for the moment they would have the good news to announce? Then, in my opinion, the prophetic word was fulfilled: "How beautiful are the feet of the messenger of happy announcements in the mountains" (Is 52,7; Rom 10,15). And yet if, by washing the feet of his disciples, Jesus makes them beautiful, how can we express the true beauty of those whom he immerses entirely in the "Holy Spirit and in fire" (Mt 3,11:14,6)? The feet of the apostles have become beautiful so that (...) they can set their foot on the holy road and walk in the one who said: "I am the way" (Jn 10,20: 53,4). For whoever has had his feet washed by Jesus, and he alone, follows that living way which leads to the Father; that way has no place for dirty feet. (...) To follow that living and spiritual way (Heb XNUMX) (...), it is necessary to have the feet washed by Jesus who laid down his clothes (...) to take the impurity of their feet in his body with that towel that was his only dress, because "he took on our pains" (Is XNUMX).