A House of Prayer
Then Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who were selling and buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. He said to them, “It is written,
‘My house shall be called a house of prayer’;
but you are making it a den of robbers.”
The blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he cured them. But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the amazing things that he did, and heard the children crying out in the temple, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they became angry and said to him, “Do you hear what these are saying?” Jesus said to them, “Yes; have you never read,
‘Out of the mouths of infants and nursing babies
you have prepared praise for yourself’?”
He left them, went out of the city to Bethany, and spent the night there.
21:13 And He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a ‘den of thieves.’ ” Obviously Jesus’ actions stunned the many people crowded into the temple area and probably drew spectators from both inside and outside. Jesus recognized an opportunity to teach, and he didn’t waste it. He quoted from Isaiah 56:7 and used it to explain God’s purpose for the temple. God’s “house” was meant to be a house of prayer, but the merchants and money changers were using it for other purposes. This was judgment on Jerusalem and the corrupt system that governed the temple. It was meant to be a place of spiritual worship, but the Jewish leaders had allowed it to become a market where extortion took place.
Not only that, but all these merchants were no more honest than thieves (the word would be more correctly translated “robbers,” as in Jeremiah 7:11, those in organized bands who worked on large-scale robberies). Jesus had just come from Jericho a few days before, along a road known for its dangerous bands of robbers that preyed on travelers. (In the story of the Good Samaritan, the man was attacked on the road between Jerusalem and Jericho—see Luke 10:30.) No organized band of robbers along that treacherous stretch of road could possibly match the thievery going on in the temple. The merchants had turned the temple into their den. This was a horrible desecration. No wonder Jesus was so angry. Mark records that Jesus entered the temple and then returned the next morning to perform this cleansing (Mark 11:11, 15–16).
In this instance, Jesus set himself in authority above the religious leaders—the high priest (Caiaphas) and all those on the Sanhedrin. They were in charge of the temple, and they would soon have words with Jesus about this episode (21:15–16).
21:14 Then the blind and the lame came to Him in the temple, and He healed them. It was significant that the blind and the lame came to Jesus in the temple. Usually they were excluded from worship in the temple based on laws stemming from 2 Samuel 5:8. With the coming of the Messiah, Jesus himself welcomed them in the temple and healed them, for he himself was greater than the temple (12:6). This was also an expected result of the messianic age (Isaiah 35:5). These are the only recorded healings inside the temple walls, indicating a new age when God would accept all people into his presence (the tearing of the curtain in the temple at Jesus’ death was another such indication, 27:51).