And there was also a strife among them, which of them should be accounted the greatest. The Lord's words in these verses are peculiar to St. Luke. The strife among the disciples which suggested the Lord's corrective sayings was evidently no mere dispute as to precedence in their places at the supper, but some question as to their respective positions in the coming kingdom of which their Master had said so much in the course of his later instructions.
It is closely connected with the "feet-washing" related at length by St. John (John 13:4-17). This has been well described as a parable in action, exhibited to illustrate forcibly the novel and sublime truth which he was teaching them, the world-teachers of the future, that in self sacrifice consisted the secret of true greatness.
In the kingdom of heaven this would be found to be conspicuously the case.