Three times in four days Jesus cast out the money-changers who were conducting business inside the Temple walls. In doing so, we are told that he cleansed the Temple, which he had also done in the beginning of his ministry (cf. John 2:13-17). By the third time the Jewish authorities would have been beside themselves in anger and frustration, as Jesus cast out the money changers and those who bought and sold within the Temple complex. Yet, because the people hung upon Jesus’ every word (Luke 19:47-48), the Jewish authorities didn’t dare seize him. They were livid, but could do nothing in public (John 12:19; cf. Luke 22:52-53).
Besides all this, what was being conducted inside the Temple compound by these businessmen was illegal. Jesus quoted two excerpts from the scriptures, one from Isaiah and the other from Jeremiah, as he drove the money-changers and the animals and the buyers and the sellers of such things out of the Temple. Jesus said: “It is written: ‘My house is a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves’ (Luke 19:46), which quotes Isaiah 56:7 “…my house shall be called a house of prayer,” and Jeremiah 7:11 “…this house… (is) become a den of robbers.”
We need to understand that Jesus was not claiming the money-changers were conducting an illegal practice, but, rather, that their business had no place in the Temple, the House of Prayer (Worship). What they and the buyers and sellers were doing was a distraction from what people came there to do.
For a fee, the money-changers exchanged the Roman, Egyptian and Persian coins, upon which were imprinted their pagan idols, for and the acceptable silver coin that would be used to purchase their sacrifices during their worship in the Temple. Additionally, they were there to receive the Temple-tax for the priests, which in turn was used to buy the things used in Temple worship, like the daily sacrifices, the shewbread and other supplies that were necessary for the priests to conduct their services for the nation throughout the year. So, Jesus wasn’t objecting to the part the money-changers played in all this.
Jesus may not even have thrown them out specifically for the corruption and thievery that went on in their business, although he didn’t approve of any of it. What Jesus objected to was that all this, whether done honestly or dishonestly, was done in his Father’s House of Prayer. What a distraction for the folks who came there to worship!
In fact, the later rabbis wrote about the law that managed the daily behavior of those who visited the Temple:
“One should avoid showing disrespect to the Eastern Gate, because it is in direct line with the Holy of Holies. A man should not enter the Temple Mount with his staff or with his shoes on or with wallet or with his feet dust-stained; nor should he make it a shortcut, and spitting [on it is forbidden.” [Babylonian Talmud – Berachoth 54a – emphasis mine]
So, it was this type of thing that Jesus objected to, and for this reason he overturned the tables of the money-changers and cast out them who bought and sold (cf. Mark 11:16).
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