Many of you might have heard or read the
incident as given in a few passages in the gospels of the New Testament Bible that
describe briefly about the public act of Jesus Christ in which he used some
kind of physical force against the money changers and traders inside the
Jerusalem temple.
Is there a need to cleanse your temples now?
As the gospel authors wrote about these from what they
had learnt in later years, there could naturally be some mismatch here and
there about the true nature of the incident, though the intentions of the
biblical authors cannot be disputed.
But fortunately, now we have the detailed chronology
of events written down for us by a more authoritative group of authors. When I
read from this new book, I get the feeling of moving back in history to the
times of when this incident really happened.
For those of you who might be a little inclined to
know more, I am reproducing* the relevant passages from this book with a little
bit adaptation to render it somewhat simplified:
Early on this Monday
morning, Jesus and the apostles assembled at the
home of Simon in Bethany, and after a brief conference they started their journey
to Jerusalem. The twelve were
strangely silent as they journeyed on toward the Jerusalem temple; they had not
recovered from the experience of the preceding
Sunday when Jesus surprised them by riding the donkey on the streets.
They were expectant, fearful, and profoundly affected by a certain feeling of
detachment growing out of the Master’s (Jesus’) sudden change of tactics,
coupled with his instruction that they were to engage in no public teaching
throughout this Passover week.
It was about nine
o’clock on this beautiful morning when these men arrived at the temple. They
went at once to the large court where Jesus so often taught, and after greeting
the believers who were awaiting him, Jesus mounted one of the teaching
platforms and began to address the gathering crowd. The apostles withdrew for a
short distance and awaited developments.
A huge commercial
traffic had grown up in association with the services and ceremonies of the
temple worship.
There was the business
of providing suitable animals for the various sacrifices. Though it was
permissible for a worshiper to provide his own sacrifice, the Jewish religious
customs required that this animal must be free from all defects.
This was to be
certified by and interpreted by official inspectors of the temple.
Many times worshippers
had experienced the humiliation of having their supposedly perfect animal
rejected by the temple examiners. It therefore became the more general practice
to purchase sacrificial animals at the temple, and although there were several
stations on near-by Olivet where they could be bought, it had become the
accepted practice to buy these animals directly from the temple’s own animal
shelters.
Gradually there had
grown up this custom of selling all kinds of sacrificial animals in the temple
courts. An extensive business, in which enormous profits were made, had thus
been brought into existence. Part of these gains was reserved for the temple
treasury, but the larger part went indirectly into the hands of the ruling
high-priestly families.
This sale of animals in
the temple prospered because, when the worshiper purchased such an animal,
although the price might be somewhat high, no more fees had to be paid, and he
could be sure about the intended sacrifice not getting rejected on the ground of
possessing any blemishes. At one time or another, systems of exorbitant
overcharge were practiced upon the common people, especially during the great
national feasts. At one time the greedy priests went so far as to demand the
equivalent of the value of a week’s labor for a pair of doves which should have
been sold to the poor for a few pennies. The kin of the high priests had
already begun to establish their bazaars in the temple precincts, those very
merchandise marts which persisted to the time of their final overthrow by a mob
three years before the destruction of the Jerusalem temple some years later.
But trading in
sacrificial animals and sundry merchandise was not the only way in which the
courts of the temple were corrupted.
At this time there was
fostered an extensive system of banking and commercial exchange which was
carried on right within the temple precincts.
And this all came about
in the following manner: The Jews coined their own silver money, and it had
become the practice to require the temple dues of one-half shekel and all other temple fees to be paid with
this Jewish coin.
This regulation
necessitated that money-changers be licensed to exchange the many sorts of
currency in circulation throughout Palestine and other provinces of the Roman Empire for this orthodox shekel of Jewish
coining.
The temple head tax,
payable by all except women, slaves, and minors, was one-half shekel, a coin
about the size of a ten-cent piece (that existed in the US in the early 1920s)
but twice as thick. By the times of Jesus the priests had also been exempted
from the payment of temple dues. Accordingly, from the 15th to the 25th of the
month preceding the Passover, accredited money-changers erected their booths in
the principal cities of Palestine for the purpose of providing the Jewish
people with proper money to meet the temple dues after they had reached
Jerusalem.
After this ten-day
period these money-changers moved on to Jerusalem and proceeded to set up their
exchange tables in the courts of the temple. They were permitted to charge the
equivalent of from three to four cents commission for the exchange of a coin
valued at about ten cents, and in case a coin of larger value was offered for
exchange, they were allowed to collect double. Likewise did these temple
bankers profit from the exchange of all money intended for the purchase of
sacrificial animals and for the payment of vows and the making of offerings.
These temple
money-changers not only conducted a regular banking business for profit in the
exchange of more than twenty sorts of money which the visiting pilgrims would
periodically bring to Jerusalem, but they also engaged in all other kinds of
transactions pertaining to the banking business. Both the temple treasury and
the temple rulers profited tremendously from these commercial activities. It
was not uncommon for the temple treasury to hold upwards of ten million dollars
while the common people languished in poverty and continued to pay these unjust
levies.
In the midst of this
noisy aggregation of money-changers, merchandisers, and cattle sellers, Jesus,
on this Monday morning, attempted to teach the gospel of the heavenly kingdom.
He was not alone in resenting this profanation of the temple; the common
people, especially the Jewish visitors from foreign provinces, also heartily
resented this profiteering desecration of their national house of worship.
As Jesus was about to
begin his address, two things happened to arrest his attention. At the money
table of a near-by exchanger a violent and heated argument had arisen over the
alleged overcharging of a Jew from Alexandria. At the same moment the air
was filled by the bellowing of some one hundred bullocks that were being driven
from one section of the animal pens to another.
To the amazement of his
apostles, standing near at hand, who refrained from participation in what so
soon followed, Jesus stepped down from the teaching platform and, going over to
the lad who was driving the cattle through the court, took from him his whip of
cords and swiftly drove the animals from the temple. But that was not all; he
strode majestically before the wondering gaze of the thousands assembled in the
temple court to the farthest cattle pen and proceeded to open the gates of every
stall and to drive out the imprisoned animals.
By this time the
assembled pilgrims were electrified, and with uproarious shouting they moved
toward the bazaars and began to overturn the tables of the money-changers. In
less than five minutes all commerce had been swept from the temple. By the time
the near-by Roman guards had appeared on the scene, all was quiet, and the
crowds had become orderly.
Jesus, returning to the
speaker’s stand, spoke to the multitude: “You have this day witnessed that which is written in the Scriptures:
‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations, but you have made
it a den of robbers.’
But before he could
utter other words, the great assembly broke out in hosannas of praise, and
presently a throng of youths stepped out from the crowd to sing grateful hymns
of appreciation that the profane and profiteering merchandisers had been
ejected from the sacred temple. By this time certain of the priests had arrived
on the scene, and one of them said to Jesus, “Do you not hear what the children
of the Levites say?” And the Master replied, “Have not you ever read, ‘Out of the mouths of babies had praise
been perfected’?”
And all the rest of
that day while Jesus taught, guards set by the people stood watch at every
archway, and they would not permit anyone to carry even an empty vessel across
the temple courts.
When the chief priests
and the scribes heard about these happenings, they were dumfounded.
All the more they
feared the Master, and all the more they determined to destroy him. But they
were perplexed. They did not know how to accomplish his death, for they greatly
feared the people, who were now so outspoken in their approval of his overthrow
of the profane profiteers.
And all this day, a day
of quiet and peace in the temple courts, the people heard Jesus’ teaching and
literally hung on his words.
This cleansing of the
temple discloses the Master’s attitude toward commercializing the practices of
religion as well as his disapproval of all forms of unfairness and profiteering
at the expense of the poor and the unlearned.
This episode also
demonstrates that Jesus did not look with approval upon the refusal to employ
force to protect the majority of any given human group against the unfair and
enslaving practices of unjust minorities who may be able to entrench themselves
behind political, financial, or religious power.
Shrewd, wicked, and
designing men are not to be permitted to organize themselves for the
exploitation and oppression of those simple kind of good, peace loving people.
My dear reader, did this narrative give you any impetus for learning
more?
