by Lisa Derringer
The days leading up to Jesus’s death on the cross and resurrection, which we celebrate at Easter, are filled with Jesus’s actions in Jerusalem. One of Jesus’s actions that has found its way into cultural issues today is found in Matthew 21:12–13.
This passage states, “And 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. He said to them, ‘It is written, “My house shall be called a house of prayer,” but you make it a den of robbers.’”
Jesus flipped tables.
Righteous Anger
Jesus never sinned, so his anger has been called righteous anger. Righteous anger can be defined as “a form of anger that aligns with God’s character and purposes. It is a response to sin, injustice, or evil that reflects God’s own displeasure with wrongdoing. Unlike human anger, which can be tainted by sin and selfishness, righteous anger is pure and seeks to uphold God’s holiness and justice.”1
Christians have used this very passage throughout generations as a means of expressing anger at whatever injustice is in the spotlight at the time.
And it is not to say that there are very real injustices that Christians should be righteously angry about, but what does this specific passage show us about righteous anger?
Context & Culture
Before answering this question, having a better understanding of the context and culture surrounding this passage is essential.
Beginning with understanding the Temple itself:
The Temple was “the central place and most holy place of worship in the Jewish faith. Within its innermost sanctuary was the Holy of Holies, the place where God’s Spirit dwelt on earth in an earlier time, although God’s spirit had departed prior to the Babylonian exile.
It was intended to be God’s earthly dwelling place. No place on earth was more sacred or special than the temple. It was built on the highest mountain in Jerusalem, Mount Moriah, the place where Abraham went to sacrifice his son Isaac.
Upon this mountain David’s son, King Solomon built and commemorated the temple to house God among His people. It was built as a more permanent replacement of the Tabernacle used since the days of the Exodus. But Solomon’s temple was destroyed during the Babylonian invasion.”2
The Temple Jesus entered was the rebuilt Temple, which is documented in the book of Ezra:
This Temple, during Herod’s reign, got an expanded makeover. Herod added “a sprawling complex. It was built on top of a massive platform of stone blocks that covered a staggering thirty-five acres, or twenty percent of the walled city space of first century Jerusalem. It was surrounded by high walls, and on its north side was a Roman fortress. Its southern side had a covered porch and colonnade called ‘Solomon’s Portico’ surrounding a massive courtyard—the court of the Gentiles.
In the center of the complex was the temple proper. It was like a long, tall, corridor divided by a series of courts and rooms. Only Jews were allowed to enter the temple proper. The first area of the temple proper was ‘The Court of Women.’ This was the furthest that purified Jewish women were permitted to come.
Next was ‘The Court of Israel’ where purified male Jews were allowed.
Third was ‘The Court of Priests.’ And finally, ‘The House of God,’ which was divided into the Holy Places and the Holy of Holies which was entered once a year by a single priest on the Day of Atonement.”3
Understanding the makeup of the Temple during the time of Christ offers a mental picture of the layout, but why was the Temple needed? The Law given to Moses in the Old Testament required the sacrifice of animals for the atonement of sins, among other things.
By the time of the New Testament, Jewish people would make long pilgrimages to the Temple in Jerusalem during Passover.
These pilgrims would bring sacrificial animals on their journey, but “It was very difficult to travel to Jerusalem with a lamb for the Passover sacrifice. If it [were] injured or found to be in some way unclean, then the worshiper would not have a sacrifice for the festival. To assist people in their Temple authorities sold ‘pre-approved’ lambs for people traveling from the Diaspora for the Passover Festival.”4It was not uncommon to have sellers in front of the Temple to accommodate these travelers.
If this were a common practice, why did Jesus show righteous anger upon encountering the money changers and animal sellers?
This may have been a common practice, but it had nothing to do with honoring the sacredness of the Temple. The money changers and sellers were not there to ensure those who made the pilgrimage to the Temple could offer their atoning sacrifices, but as a business transaction.
They turned the House of Prayer into a den of thieves.
Inflating Prices & Exchange Rates
The selling and exchange of goods at the Temple was something that the sellers used as a means of making extra profits off of those who had traveled long distances. While typically a sacrifice was an animal, if there were those too poor to bring or buy an animal, doves were permitted under the Law of Moses.
The sellers forced those who were poor “to purchase the birds from traders approved by the temple authorities, often at inflated prices.”5 To pay for their purchases, they must exchange their money for Roman currency “(with the face of Caesar on it) at an unfair exchange rate for temple shekels approved by the religious authorities.
The poor were robbed, not once but twice: when they changed money, and when they purchased the two doves.”6
Disrupting Worship
Before the death and resurrection of Christ, the Temple was where Jews could come to worship. But there was also a separate part of the Temple for Gentiles to worship. It is in this very area where Jesus found the sellers and money changers, so “their activities took up the only place where Gentiles could possibly come to seek and worship God.”7
Jesus was not only angry about the only area for Gentiles to worship being filled with merchants, but it was the priests who allowed this to happen. Their lack of reverence for the Temple showed they “cared nothing for true worship as long as they could make money and keep up the rituals.
Our Savior hated this sacrilege, which kept the nations from learning about the living God in His sanctuary.”8
Fulfilling Prophecy
Jesus is the fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies for the coming Messiah. When speaking to the Pharisees in John 2:19, concerning whether he had the authority to remove merchants from the Temple, Jesus responds with, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”
This response was not understood by the Pharisees because “the Jewish opposition did not understand Jesus. (In fact, even the disciples did not get our Lord’s meaning at first because they did not understand Jesus’ saying until His resurrection.)
The Jews thought Jesus was talking about the physical temple in Jerusalem, which had taken forty-six years to build. In fact, the temple was not even really finished in Jesus’ day because work on it would continue off and on until AD 63, some thirty years after Jesus’ death and resurrection.”9
Final Thoughts
Let’s go back to the question at the beginning of this post. What does this passage show us about righteous anger?
Jesus’s anger was never out of control, enacted with no selfishness; the target was sinful actions and true injustice. There was no hatred in his actions; this action was decisive with no bitterness, and most importantly, Jesus’s actions were always focused on accomplishing God’s will.10
We see in Jesus’s example that the result of righteous anger should always focus on God’s will. Cleansing the Temple was for the benefit of those being exploited, but this righteous anger was focused on the fact that these actions were the result of the sinful behavior of the sellers and money changers, as well as the Jewish leaders who allowed this to happen.
God cannot tolerate sin, so when we, as believers, are acting with righteous anger, the question we must ask ourselves is, are we angry because of the sins being committed, or are we angry because we think that what is happening seems unfair to our current culture?
Notes
- Bible Hub, “Topical Bible: Understanding Righteous Anger,” 2026, https://biblehub.com/topical/u/understanding_righteous_anger.htm.
- The Bible Says, “Matthew 21:12–13 meaning,” 2022, https://thebiblesays.com/en/commentary/mat+21:12.
- The Bible Says, “Matthew 21:12–13 meaning.”
- Phillip J. Long, “Mark 11:15–19 — Selling in the Temple?” Reading Acts, November 4, 2012. https://readingacts.com/2012/11/04/mark-1115-19-selling-in-the-temple/.
- Our Daily Bread, “Day 2 – Jesus Cleanses the Temple,” Our Daily Bread Ministries, April 6, 2022, https://ourdailybread.org/following-jesus-to-the-cross-hk/day02/.
- Our Daily Bread, “Jesus Cleanses the Temple.”
- Our Daily Bread, “Jesus Cleanses the Temple.”
- Ligonier Ministries, “Jesus Cleanses the Temple,” 2008, https://learn.ligonier.org/devotionals/jesus-cleanses-temple.
- Ligonier Ministries, “The Temple of Jesus’ Body,” January 24, 2018, https://learn.ligonier.org/devotionals/temple-of-jesus-body.
- GotQuestions.org, “Was Jesus Ever Angry?” May 30, 2006, https://www.gotquestions.org/Jesus-angry.html.