And when he was gone forth into the way
For when he had blessed the children he departed from the coasts
of Judea, on the further side of Jordan, and steered his course
towards Jerusalem, ( Mark 10:32 ) , and as he
was on the road thitherwards,
there came one running;
a young man, a ruler among the Jews, and very rich, a person of
great dignity, and large substance; he hearing that Christ was
going from those parts, ran in great haste to him, to have some
conversation with him, before he was entirely gone;
and kneeled to him;
as a token of great respect and civility: some versions, as the
Persic and Ethiopic, render it, "and worshipped him"; which must
be understood not in a religious, but in a civil way: the words
might be literally rendered, "and kneeled him"; and Dr. Lightfoot
suspects, that more is meant than bending his knees to Christ;
that he also might take hold of the knees of Christ, and kiss
them, as was usual with the Jewish Rabbins, and which he
illustrates by several instances:
and asked him, good master, what shall I do that I may
inherit
eternal life?
This man, though a young man, and also a rich man, was thoughtful
of the world to come, and the life of it: he believed there was
an eternal life after this state of things, and so was no
Sadducee; but he had wrong notions about the way and manner of
attaining it: he thought it was to be had by the works of the
law, which shows him to be a Pharisee; whereas eternal life is
the gift of God, through the Messiah, the person he now applied
to, and who had the words of eternal life; and to a more proper
person he could not have put the question, he being himself the
way, the truth, and the life, or the true way to eternal life:
and had he attended to his own words, which suggest, that eternal
life is an inheritance, he might have learned, that it is not to
be acquired by the industry and works of men; but, that it is the
bequest of our heavenly Father to his children, and comes by
will, by promise, and as a free gift; so that it is not of the
law; nor are they that are of the law heirs of it, ( Romans 4:14 ) (
Galatians 3:18 ) ;
(See Gill on Matthew
19:16).