After that he poured water into a basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which he was girded.
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Clement Of Alexandria
AD 215
This was, then, what the anointed feet prophesied-the treason of Judas, when the Lord went to His passion. And the Saviour Himself washing the feet of the disciples,
Then He puts water into a bason and begins to wash the feet of his disciples, and wipe them with the towel with which He was girded. S. Cyprian, Theophylact, and Euthymius note that Christ did all these things by Himself, without the aid or help of any one, to teach us how attentively and carefully we ought to serve others. Euthymius adds that Christ Himself asked the master of the house for the basin, and drew and brought the water. "What wonder," says S. Augustine (Tract55), "if He who poured forth His blood on the earth to wash away the uncleanness of sin poured water into a bason to wash the feet of His disciples? What wonder if He who made firm with the flesh He had taken upon Him the footsteps of His Evangelists, wiped with the towel He was girded with the feet that He had washed?"
Symbolically, S. Ambrose (Book i, "On the Holy Spirit") says, "This water was the heavenly dew. This it was that was prophesied, that with that heavenly dew the Lord Jesus should wash the feet of His ...
St. Ambrose and St. Bernard show that this washing was mysterious, and significative of the very great purity expected of those that receive the blessed Eucharist.
