the title of my paper)Jerusalem’s Second Temple served as the center of Jewish religion and culture for almost six centuries. During Jesus’ life and ministry in Palestine the Temple remained central to Judaism. By the time the writer of the Gospel of John authored his version of Jesus’ story the Temple was but a memory. The memory of what came to be known as Herod’s Temple likely brought about an assortment of emotions to the readers of John’s Gospel. To some it remained a tangible reminder of God’s presence until its destruction in 70 CE. For others the rubble represented little more than the last vestiges of a corrupt institution. The narrative of Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple is, along with the feeding of the five thousand and his death and resurrection, one of only a handful of stories contained in all four canonical gospels. For many Christians, now and in centuries past, this story represents Jesus’ anger at the presence of and corruption associated with the marketplace located in the Temple’s Court of Gentiles. However, Jesus’ actions and words in John 2:12-18 condemn not only the corruption of the marketplace in Herod’s Temple, but also, and to a greater extent, the institution of the Temple itself, and in doing so establishes himself as the center of God’s presence on earth.
From the time King Cyrus ordered the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem until its destruction by Roman forces, the institution served a plurality of purposes. The assumed purpose of the Temple varied dependent on the nationality, status, and religion of the person making the assumption. Leaders of imperial powers which ruled over Judea, such as the Persians, Seleucids, and the Romans, saw the Temple primarily as a source of income to support the military forces needed to maintain their occupation of Palestine. The pious Jew viewed the Temple as “the locus of God’s presence on earth” (New Interpreter’s Bible 544). To the priests of Judaism it represented their source of power and their livelihood. This attitude in conjunction with the Temple as a source of taxes for the occupying forces led to the corruption of the Temple institution. The cultic practices of prayer, sacrifice, and ritual worship became secondary to money and power. This corruption seemed to reach its pinnacle during the rule of the Seleucid Empire as Jason and then Menelaus bought the ‘honor’ of the high priesthood from Antiochus Epiphanes. The corruption did not begin or end with the feud between Jason and Menelaus. Throughout the Hasmonean dynasty and into Roman rule the Temple became less a representation of God’s presence and more and more a financial institution.
This transformation seemed to be fully realized when Herod, as part of his renovations to the Temple, moved the marketplace onto the Temple Mount and inside the Temple walls. For many Jews, the presence of a marketplace on the Temple Mount stood as a visual reminder of that corruption. In reality the marketplace served a valid purpose, especially during major festivals such as Passover; the setting for Jesus’ fit of outrage in John’s Gospel. Part of celebrating Passover for those who made pilgrimage to Jerusalem included offering a sacrifice in the Temple and paying temple tax. The fact that many of the worshipers were pilgrims who travelled great distances to celebrate in Jerusalem precluded them from bringing their own animals for sacrifice. They would need a means of purchasing animals in Jerusalem. Payment of the Temple Tax presented another challenge for the pilgrims. The currency they brought into Jerusalem was invalid for paying the temple tax because of the presence of human images on the coins. These pilgrims needed a means of changing this foreign money into acceptable Tyrian shekels. As stated in the New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary, “Therefore, the sale of animals and the changing of money were necessary if the worship of the cult were to continue” (543).
The writer of the Gospel of John, or as named by various sources, the Fourth Evangelist, wrote to a post-temple audience. According to most scholars the author of the Gospel was not the Apostle John, son of Zebedee, despite his being identified as the author by many early theologians. “Many scholars doubt this identification but agree that these books (the Gospel, the Johannine Epistles, and Revelation) are derived from a common school, influenced by one dominant teacher (The Access Bible, New Testament 129). Most modern scholars acknowledge an unknown author for the fourth Gospel. Many agree, however, that the work originated in a community of Christians late in the first century CE. According to the New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary, “The manuscript evidence and the evidence of early church tradition thus suggest that the Gospel was completed no later than 100 CE” (504). The Commentary also proffers that other evidence “suggests 75-80 CE as the earliest possible date of composition” (505).
The Fourth Evangelist wrote this Gospel for a community of Jewish Christians in the first century. The location of the community and of the authorship of the Gospel is unknown. What is clear is that the author wrote to a group in the midst of persecution. “The Fourth Evangelist and those for whom he wrote understood themselves to be a persecuted religious minority, expelled from the synagogue, their religious home, because of their faith in Jesus (New Interpreter’s Bible 505). Around the time of the Gospel’s writing a formal benediction was published which dealt with excommunicating heretics from synagogue. The Benediction Against Heretics (Birkath ha-Minim) was “introduced into the synagogue liturgy sometime after the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple in 70 CE and probably between 85 and 95 CE” (New Interpreter’s Bible 504). This practice became a reality for many in the Fourth Evangelist’s intended audience. The phrase “put out of the synagogue” occurs three times in the Fourth Gospel. Scholars believe this phrase “refers to events at the same time the Gospel was written and highlights the tension, perceived or real, between Johannine Christians and the religious authorities of their day” (New Interpreter’s Study Bible 1927).
The Fourth Evangelist uses several theological themes throughout his Gospel to challenge the Temple and in doing so challenged those who persecuted the community to which he wrote. The first of those themes is the incarnation.
To understand the theological world of John, one must begin by recognizing the centrality of the incarnation to the Gospel. The Theological significance of the incarnation is cogently expressed in two lines from the Prologue: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (1:1) and “the Word became flesh and lived among us” (1:14). These two claims are the foundation on which the rest of the Gospel is built: Jesus is the incarnate Word of God. (New Interpreter’s Bible 495).
In other words, Jesus is God’s revelation to the world. It is through Jesus that we access God. “Jesus is God’s Word. No line can be drawn between what Jesus says and what he does, between his identity and mission in the world. Jesus’ words and works, his life and death, form an indissoluble whole that provides full and fresh access to God.” (New Interpreter’s Bible 495). This belief flies in the face of traditional Jewish concepts of “accessing God.” Access to God came solely through the priests and their cultic rituals performed in the Jerusalem Temple. The concept of “worshipping” God away from the Temple, even after its destruction, likely represented one of the heresies for which Birkath ha-Minim was written and performed.
The second theme is similar to the first: Jesus as a replacement for the Temple. In the narrative of John 2:12-18 and beyond to verse 22, Jesus challenges the institution of Temple worship. By driving out the livestock present and pouring out the coins of the money changers (likely mixing pure Tyrian shekels with impure Imperial coinage) Jesus effectively ended Temple worship for that day. By these actions, “Jesus issues a powerful challenge to the very authority of the Temple and its act of worship” (New Interpreter’s Bible 543). Jesus’ words and the author’s commentary following the cleansing focus his audience and the readers of John’s Gospel toward their new source of access to God, Jesus himself. “Jesus answered them, ‘Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.’ The Jews then said, ‘This Temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and you will raise it up in three days?’ But he was speaking of the temple of his body” (New Interpreter’s Study Bible, John 2.19-21). The New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary offers this reflection on these verses, “Jesus is the locus of God’s presence on earth, and God as known in Jesus, not the Temple, should be the focal point of cultic activity” (545). The Fourth Evangelist continues this theme with Jesus’ interaction with the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s Well in Sychar. “The woman said to him, ‘Sir, I see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither here on this mountain nor in Jerusalem’” (John 4.19-21)
The story of Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple remains as relevant for the modern Christian church as it was for first-century Judaism and Jewish Christians. In many ways the Jerusalem Temple had become an idol, especially considering the pride many Jews felt for Herod’s refurbished Temple. The religious leaders of the day became an impediment between the people and God instead of a conduit between the two parties. Many modern churches fall into these same traps. Many times our faith becomes more about the church we attend or the pastor to whom we listen instead of the God we serve. The New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary puts it this way:
Christian faith communities must be willing to ask where and when the status quo of religious practices and institutions has been absolutized and, therefore, closed to the possibility of reformation, change, and renewal. The great danger is that the contemporary church, like the religious establishment in the Gospel of John, will fall into the trap of equating the authority of its own institutions with the presence of God. All religious institutional embeddedness – whether in the form of temple worship, unjust social systems, or repressive religious practices – is challenged by the revelation of God in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. (New Interpreter’s Bible 545)
In other words, just as Jesus challenged and condemned the institution of the Jerusalem Temple, he also challenges and condemns our modern day religiosity that prevents us from experiencing God’s grace through Jesus.
For almost six hundred years the Jerusalem Temple represented God’s presence on earth. As the decades passed, through Imperial exploitation, greedy religious leaders, and simple convenience the institution became corrupt. In the Gospel of John the Fourth Evangelist sought to establish Jesus as the new picture of God’s presence on earth. Through the actions and words of Jesus in John 2:12-18, the Gospel demonstrates Jesus’ authority over the corrupt system of Temple worship. “Jesus has the authority to challenge the authority of the Temple because his whole life bears testimony to the power of God in the world” (New Interpreter’s Bible 545).
Works Cited
New Interpreter's Bible: A Commentary in Twelve Volumes. Vol. IX. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995.
The Access Bible. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.
The New Interpreter's Study Bible. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2003.
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