Jesus answered and said unto him,.... Upbraiding him with his continued and invincible ignorance, which was aggravated by his dignified character:art thou a master in Israel? or "of Israel", as all the Oriental versions render it, as it literally may be rendered he was one of the larvy ymkx, "wise men", or "doctors of Israel" , so often mentioned by the Jews.
One of the Jewish doctors was answered, by a boy, just in such language as is here used; who, not understanding the direction he gave him about the way into the city, said to him,larvy lv Mkx awh hta, "art thou he, a doctor", or "master of Israel?"
did not I say to thee so? &c. He was not a common teacher; not a teacher of babes, nor a teacher in their synagogues, or in their "Midrashim", or divinity schools, but in their great sanhedrim; and the article before the word used will admit it to be rendered, "that master", doctor, or teacher; that famous, and most excellent one, who was talked of all over Jerusalem and Judea, as a surpassing one: and now, though he was not only an Israelite, with whom were the laws, statutes, judgments, and oracles of God, the writings of Moses, and the prophets; but a teacher of Israelites, and in the highest class of teachers, and of the greatest fame among them, yet was he ignorant of the first and most important things in religion:and knowest not these things?
which were so plainly to be suggested in the sacred writings, with which he was; or ought to have been conversant: for the same things Christ had been speaking of, are there expressed by a circumcision of the heart; by a birth, a nation's being born at once; by sanctification; by the grace of God signified under the metaphor of water; and by quickening persons, comparable to dry bones, through the wind blowing, and breathing into them, De 30:6.
Derech Eretz, fol. 18. 1. Echa Rabbati, fol. 44.