“Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons” (Matthew 21:12–13).
In the synoptic gospels the triumphal entry is followed by Jesus cleansing the Temple. The Temple was, at that time, the centre and symbol of the Jewish religion. It was where sacrifice was made for sins committed, and where the priests interceded with God on behalf of His people – it was the place where God met with man.
Temple: the old reality
Up until this point Jesus had been healing (forgiving sins) and teaching the things of God to the people. In essence, He was doing things that were upstaging the Temple and embodying a radical alternativism. God was doing something that was making this system redundant. Jesus’ outburst in the Temple, in front of huge crowds attending to celebrate Passover, further highlights the inadequacy of the Temple. It was not what it was supposed to be. Quoting Jeremiah, Jesus said, “Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, I myself have seen it, declares the LORD” (Jeremiah 7:11).
Driving out the animals and rebuking the traders and moneylenders was a way of symbolically stopping the sacrificial system in place at that time, emphasising that this was a system under judgment; a system that one day would stop completely because the Temple would be destroyed.
Jesus: the new reality
Jesus was the reality to which the Temple pointed. Like all things in the Old Testament, the Temple had been a signpost to God’s future. Now it was right for destruction, not because it was necessarily bad but because it wasn’t enough – Jesus was offering something better. He would be the ark upon which God’s presence rests, the lamp of the world, the altar from which things ascend and descend between heaven and earth. He would supercede the Temple through His sacrificial death and resurrection and the giving of the Holy Spirit. Jesus told His disciples as much when he said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” (John 2:19). Now nothing could get in the way of man meeting with God because He is the real Temple, the embodiment of ‘God with us’.
The Temple was merely a signpost to the reality that was Jesus. The Jews continued to look at the signpost and in doing so missed the point. We can also get distracted by signposts in the form of ideology or idolatry and miss the point. This Easter may we see past the signposts and gaze on the reality and the beauty of Christ.
Lisa Skinner is a Senior Communications Assistant in the Creative Production Department of the Presbyterian Church at Assembly Buildings.