“Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the money-changers doing business. When He had made a whip of cords, He drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changers’ money and overturned the tables. And He said to those who sold doves, ‘Take these things away! Do not make My Father’s house a house of merchandise!’” John 2:13-16.
This feast used to be called the Passover of the Lord, yet here and throughout the New Testament this and other feasts are referred to as the Passover of the Jews, or a feast of the Jews, why is this so?
After the Jews were taken to Babylon between 605 B.C. and 586 by Nebuchadnezzar they were allowed to return to Israel after Cyrus the Persian conquered Babylon in October 539 B.C.
Cyrus issued a decree in 538 B.C. allowing the Jews to return to their homeland, which some 50,000 did, as described in the book of Ezra chapters 1-6.
Ezra at a later date went to Jerusalem himself to bring about a very successful spiritual revival, see Ezra chapters 7-10. Another book about the history of this period is Nehemiah which was written just after Ezra.
The point here is to show that the Israelites had renounced idolatry and turned to the God of their fathers. As to exactly how long this lasted is unknown, but it could not have been too much longer after the writing of Nehemiah.
The Persians allowed the Israelites to practice their religion, and put the high priests in charge of ruling Judea. While this ensured more freedom for the people, it also politicized the priesthood, and corrupted that institution.
Alexander the Great defeated the Persians in 333 B.C. and shortly afterward took control of Israel. While Alexander was beneficent as were some of his successors; yet about 163 years later the infamous Antiochus Epiphanes killed many of the Jews and sacrificed a swine on the altar of burnt offering in 170 B.C. The revolt of the Maccabees began shortly afterward.
Some Jews at that time sympathized with the Hellenistic party which was attempting to introduce Greek customs and thought into Israel, while the orthodox Jews vehemently opposed it.
Out of this culture invasion came the Sadducees who were mostly of the wealthy and the powerful. Not surprisingly, they resemble the rich and powerful of today.
They welcomed things like social engineering and rejected the authenticity of Scripture and sought pseudo-intellectual teachings that tickled the ears and justified or ignored their immoral behavior.
The priesthood eventually fell under the control of the Sadducees who were Hellenist and rejected a great deal of the Scriptures, they did not believe in resurrection, angels or spirits.
The Pharisees were on the other end of the spectrum, rejecting Hellenism, embracing faithfulness to the law and strict adherence to its rituals, the name Pharisee means, separatist.
Their strict keeping of rules and regulations eventually closed them off from the spirit of the law and led to pride in their spiritual superiority and with pride came hypocrisy.
It is these things that caused them to reject the Christ, and the things the Lord denounced in His day. It can be said that they had a noble beginning and an ignominious end.
It is no wonder that the law which was meant to act as a tutor to draw the Israelites to a true relationship with God, like that of Abraham or Moses, became just a bunch of rules to be obeyed to get to heaven.
“But before faith [in Christ] came, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed. Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.” Galatians 3:23-26.
Because of these things the Lord’s feasts became another feast to be kept; a feast of the Jews.
In the same way secularism and liberal theology have done so much to change Christmas and Easter into holidays celebrated with Santa Claus, the Easter bunny, and spring break.
While I do not have too much of a problem with this, since it is what it is, that does not mean Christians should forget the solemnity of these occasions.
God expressed His anger with Israel’s deadness around 450 to 400 B.C. through the prophet Malachi, years before Hellenism, the Sadducees, or the Pharisees started taking root. The following passage also speaks to many Christians today.
“A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am the Father, where is My honor? And if I am a Master, where is My reverence? Says the Lord of hosts to you priests who despise My name. Yet you say, ‘In what way have we despised Your name?’ You offer defiled food on My altar. But you say, ‘In what way have we defiled You?’ By saying, ‘The table of the Lord is contemptible.’ And when you offer the blind as a sacrifice, is it not evil? And when you offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? Offer it then to your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you favorably?” Says the Lord of hosts. “But now entreat God’s favor, that He may be gracious to us. While this is being done by your hands, will He accept you favorably?” Says the Lord of hosts. “Who is there even among you who would shut the doors, so that you would not kindle fire on My altar in vain? I have no pleasure in you,” says the Lord of Hosts, “Nor will I accept an offering from your hands.” Malachi 1:6-10.
“And He found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the money-changers doing business.” John 2:14.
The sin here is not that there were money-changers and those who sold cattle, these men filled a need.
Jews came from around the world to the temple and rich or poor they were required to pay a half shekel into the sacred treasury as an offering to the Lord.
The half shekel had to be exact and since they would only have foreign money they needed to exchange it for the coin acceptable to the temple.
Money changers made a lot of money because they charged a sum to exchange the unsuitable money for the correct shekel.
The same held true for those who sold sheep and oxen. It would be difficult to travel from Rome to Jerusalem with a sheep or ox and expect it to arrive in pristine condition.
These too performed a service and as long as none of them cheated or gouged someone it was legitimate.
But it says of Jesus, “…He found in the temple those who sold”; these greedy men were not content to sell their wares a couple of blocks away from the temple, no, they had to be right in the court of the Gentiles or thereabouts.
Imagine going to church and trying to worship with the din of voices, the lowing of oxen, and the bleating of sheep. Are you there to worship the Lord or to listen to a racket?
Avaricious vendors are not concerned with whether someone is worshipping or weeping before the Lord, only with the sales. Here is Jesus’ response.
“Take these things away! Do not make My Father’s house a house of merchandise!” John 2:16b.
“Then His disciples remembered that it was written, ‘Zeal for Your house has eaten Me up.’ So the Jews answered and said to Him, ‘What sign do You show to us, since You do these things?’ Jesus answered and said to them, ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.’ Then the Jews said, ‘It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will You raise it up in three days?’ But He was speaking of the temple of His body.’” John 2:17-21.
Now when you visualize this, the response of the Jews seems somewhat logical; some unknown madman is tearing up the outer court and driving the vendors out.
Naturally your response is going to be, “What the?” But it is their response that is incredible; “What sign do You show to us, since You do these things?”
Just what sign do they need to understand that turning God’s temple into a marketplace should not have happened?
Find any description of the temple and find a place set aside for tables and vendors stalls. There are none!
One possible similar event is described in Nehemiah 13:4-9. Nehemiah, after being absent from Jerusalem for a time, found that the priest had given a room in the temple to a man named Tobiah an enemy of Israel.
Nehemiah properly and very rudely threw the furnishings of Tobiah’s room out and commanded that the room be cleansed and returned to its proper usage.
In like manner, rather than questioning a man who finally had the courage to cleanse the temple of such godless practice, the Jews should have asked themselves why they had allowed it in the first place.
But this is more than a man; this is God incarnate coming into His own temple.
“And the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to His temple, even the Messenger of the covenant…” Malachi 3:3b.
And He does give them a sign, which is to be carried out later.
“Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” John 2:19b.
This is such an odd incomprehensible statement, but you have to wonder how else He could have put it. If He had said, “Kill Me, and in three days I will rise again.” They may have said, “Very well, we will accommodate you!”
So, it would seem that such a clear prophecy might have created the wrong atmosphere for the Lord to begin His ministry.
Their incredulous reply that “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will You raise it up in three days [the temple was not finished until 64 A.D. and was completely destroyed in 70 A.D.]?” Jesus’ statement had entirely missed the mark, but they were not the ones for whom it was meant.
“Therefore, when He had risen from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this to them; and they believed the Scripture and the word which Jesus had said.” John 2:22.
It was meant for His disciples, to confirm the things which they had already read in Scripture. It is possible that some of those present in the temple on that day realized the same thing and received the Lord Jesus Christ.
Sheep and Money-Changers, John 2:13-22 taken from godisrevealed.com posted on 6-22-12, updated on 6-15-17.
Scripture taken from the New King James version; copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission, all rights reserved.