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The next instance of money changing brings us to the life and death of Jesus Christ. The occurrence is commonly known as the cleansing of the temple and many historians believe this incident to be one of the most significant events described in the bible and that occurred in Jesus’ life. According to Professor David Landry of the University of St. Thomas, "the importance of the episode is signaled by the fact that within a week of this incident, Jesus is dead. Matthew, Mark, and Luke agree that this is the event that functioned as the 'trigger' for Jesus' death."
You’ll begin to notice the reoccurring theme of people who rebel against the money-changers being labeled as traitors and are murdered. You will also begin to realize a theme that if it weren’t for the money changers labeling their own citizens as rebellious then these people would otherwise be innocent and moral. Again, Jesus was put to death because of how he rejected the Money Changers practices and fought for the equity, rights, and privileges of the poor, and ultimately, he paid the consequences. So, let’s talk about it.
The cleansing of the temple is recorded in all four of the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John). There are also non-Christian and non-religious accounts of the events that occurred, making it a very popular event that was spread word-to-mouth around the surrounding area. In addition to its popularity as a written and oral story, large portions of Christian art decipher the events that took place during the cleansing and will be shown below. Around the year 25 A.D the Jewish people around the world were making their way to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. Passover is a holy week to people of the Jewish religion, where they celebrate the biblical story of how God freed them from slavery and began a new spiritual relationship called a covenant relationship.
Jesus Christ was one of the Jews making his way toward the temple and behind him was the crowd of followers and disciples who were following Jesus' views, passions, and authority. Different accounts estimate that at the time of Jesus’ arrival there were around 200-300 thousand people inside of the city celebrating the holy holiday. As Jesus rode his Donkey down the hillside with his followers behind him, he was shocked at what he was seeing. The temple, a place of spiritual and holy connection was filled with merchants, different types of livestock, and in the center of the temple were Money Changers.
The money changers had set up shop inside the walls of the religious complex and were taking the many different forms of money and value from the travelers around the world and exchanging it for the half-shekel of the sanctuary, a half-ounce of pure silver, similar to the size of a half-dollar today. This was crucial because to the jews, the half-shekel was the only coin at the time in circulation with a weight that was certain and didn’t have the face of an emperor on the coin, therefore making it the only coin the Jerusalem merchants would accept. The travelers needed the money in order to purchase animals for sacrifice and a blessing from God, a tax that was needed to enter the temple building. The money changers were taking advantage of the travelers and milking them for their value by cornering the market of currency. The issue isn’t that the Money Changers were performing this service, the issue was that the Money Changers were monopolizing every currency around the world, including the half-shekel in order to influence the price of goods and services in their favor. Once they were able to monopolize the half-shekel, they increased the price of the exchange, effectively taking part in capital control and monetary policy like governments and central banks do today, and began to profit on the hundreds of thousands of jews that made their way to Jerusalem every year for a religious holiday by increasing the price of the half-shekel. And the money changers were doing so in God’s house. Needless to say, when Jesus saw this, it made him angry.
In John 2:13-25 it says this,
“The Passover of Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers at their business. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all, with the sheep and oxen, out of the temple; and he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. And he told those who sold the pigeons,
“Take these things away you shall not make my Father’s house, a house of trade.” His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for thy house will consume me.”
The Jews then said to him, “What sign have you to show us for doing this?”
Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”
The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?”
But he spoke of the temple of his body. When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word which Jesus had spoken. Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs which he did; but Jesus did not trust himself to them, because he knew all men and needed no one to bear witness of man’ for he himself knew what was in man.”
This was the first- and only time during Jesus’ ministry that he would be brought to use physical force to get his point across. Jesus flipped over the tables of the Money changers inside of the temple and used a whip to scare them out of the courtyard that was built for spiritual purposes. Jesus then went to the center of the temple where a large crowd would surround him. Jesus shouted out to all who could hear, “This is supposed to be a place of worship, but you have made it a den of rebels.”
In response, the Roman money changers and elite began to develop plans to execute Jesus and put an early stop to the development of a rebellion. The money changers viewed what Jesus was doing as treason, but in order to get him executed a Roman Governor named Pontius Pilate had to make the ultimate decision. After much deliberation, Pilate saw that Jesus wasn’t a threat to the Roman empire and didn’t deserve to be sentenced to death. Nonetheless, the money changers and elite convinced Pilate and changed out Jesus, an innocent man, for a thief who was scheduled to be executed. During the time the guards were coming to get Christ, he had a meal with his disciples during Passover. The broken bread represented Jesus broken body and the wine represented Jesus’ blood which would establish a covenant relationship between God and Israel from that point forward. After the meal, the guards found Jesus praying in a garden. The money changers and elite then commanded the guards to escort Jesus to a Roman execution device, or the cross, where he was being nailed and hung by his hands and feet in between two Roman thieves. All the while, there was a large gathering of Romans and Jesus disciples watching the scene take place. During the time Jesus was on the cross, there are varying accounts of what exactly happened and what was said.
In the Gospel of Mark and Matthew, there was only one thing reported to be spoken on the cross, however, it has gone through numerous translations and variations and some historians disagree on the exact translation. Jesus was claimed to say, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?”
In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus purportedly said,
“Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.”
"Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise”
“Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.”
In the Gospel of John Jesus allegedly was quoted as saying,
"Woman, here is your son."
“"I am thirsty.”
“It is Finished.”
Keep in mind that these are accounts from Gospels and therefore Its possible all of these things were said or none of these things were said. However, it's important to get the context for what was happening in the last breath of Jesus' life and why he was put there in the first place. There you have it, the story of another motivated and moral individual fighting for the rights and privileges of the poor and abused being murdered by the Money Changers and elite who need to have a poor class in the nation, so their profits will continue to feed off of others actual and real hard labor.
Christ Expelling the Money-Changers from the Temple by Nicolas Colombel
Christ Cleansing the Temple by Bernardino Mei
