Commentaries:
Robertson's Word Pictures (NT)
If I then (ei oun egw). Argumentative sense of oun (therefore). Condition of first class, assumed to be true, with first aorist active indicative of niptw, "If I, being what I am, washed your feet" (as I did).
Ye also ought (kai umeiv ofeilete). The obligation rests on you a fortiori. Present active indicative of the old verb ofeilw, to owe a debt (Matthew 18:30). The mutual obligation is to do this or any other needed service. The widows who washed the saints' feet in 1 Timothy 5:10 did it "as an incident-of their hospitable ministrations" (Bernard). Up to 1731 the Lord High Almoner in England washed the feet of poor saints (pedilavium) on Thursday before Easter, a custom that arose in the fourth century, and one still practised by the Pope of Rome.
Other commentary entries containing this verse:
John 17:11
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