The Trouble with Jesus
by Constance Hastings
This time it was different. Way different. Whether the change was in Jesus or in the setting, it’s hard to tell. Maybe he noticed something he’d not been aware of before, or maybe it was he that had changed, grown, realized something in himself.
Passover Remembrance
As a child, his family had made the yearly trip to the Temple for the Jewish Passover celebration. He must have loved it because there was this story of how one year he had stayed there for three extra days talking with the Temple teachers. While they were quite impressed with his questions, his precocious interests had given his parents a fit, thinking he was lost or worse. He excused himself by saying they should have known he’d be in his “Father’s house.” (Luke 2:41-52)
However, business as usual didn’t come close to that week’s hectic activity. To celebrate Passover, one had to bring the prescribed offering, a perfect animal specimen to sacrifice for one’s sins. Their history and heritage remembered the lamb whose blood had been painted on the doorposts of homes, signaling for the angel of death to pass over and not take the life of the home’s firstborn son.
It was the final plague that convinced Pharaoh to release the Israelites from the enslavement of Egypt to travel back to the land of their fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Blood was necessary for a life to be saved. Now, hundreds of years later, their faith told them to remember their deliverance from both sin and slavery by this yearly pilgrimage. Jerusalem and the Temple site was cram-crowded with pilgrim travelers from everywhere Jews lived or had been dispersed.
Commercial Reality
Actually, the scene was born of practical matters. People who came from long distances couldn’t bring with them an animal to sacrifice. Then there was the matter of paying the Temple tax. Hebrew law would not allow engraved images claiming to be a god inside the main gates. There needed to be an accessible way to exchange Roman currency for Jewish shekels. In short, for all surface appearances, the selling of animals and the exchange of money looked as if it was an accommodation for people to faithfully practice their religion.
Reactionary Passion
But something in the scene, likely almost deafening and even malodorous (in other words, it stunk like you know what), stopped Jesus from going inside. Maybe no one noticed a rage building within him as he twisted ropes into a whip. But in a volcanic eruption, he exploded on them, driving away the animals, turning over the tables of the exchange kiosks, coins of all kinds and values scattering and clanging on the floor. Strangely, he stopped at the dove sellers’ booth, but ordered them out saying, “Don’t turn my Father’s house into a marketplace!”
Ok, you’ve lost it with this one. Jesus, the one sent from God as the Son of God, goes ballistic right outside his church. In this day and age, he’d be taken in as a terrorist. Whatever happened to being the Light of the World and Love and all that kind of sweet, meek-and-mild Jesus? And he’s angry, raging-mad kind of angry? Are you saying this is ok with God? Sorry people, but this doesn’t seem like the right road we should follow here. Too many people are going to get hurt if you get behind this guy.
Abusive Ritual
Understood. But don’t act as if you haven’t seen this before and always disapproved. Still, there were things going on not obvious to contemporary reading but contextually understood by the early readers of John’s account.
Remember, as a child he’d known the Temple as his “Father’s house,” the same as he’d called it that very day. But as an adult, Jesus now knew of the systematic injustices the Temple inflicted upon the faithful, especially those who could least afford it. Religious robbery would sum up what was going on. The required unblemished animal sacrifice would cost you plenty. Besides that, another fleecing happened with exorbitant rates of exchange charged to get your cash converted for the Temple tax. If all of that didn’t get up your crawl, corruption was inherent in the status of the priests. It was supposed to be inherited as being part of the Levitical tribe of priests, but in reality, the appointment of the chief priest had to have the approval of the Roman government. Furthermore, kickbacks were necessary to keep happy them and allow the Jews to worship and even make a living. Would this infuriate you? To come at them slinging righteous anger and a whip may have let them off easy.
Twisted Teaching
Yet, another deeper, maybe even damning issue could have disturbed Jesus even more. The prophets had pleaded for it, but the Pharisees only acerbated it. As gatekeepers of the Law, they held their thumbs on the populace with ritualistic requirements that often were near impossible for the average person to meet. People learned from this that God cared more about the sacrifices needed for their infringements than their relationship with their Creator. How people washed their hands was elevated above Love of God and neighbor. Temple worship was a farce, and it raised the rile in Jesus.
The disciples were watching. They knew the prophetic words of Psalm 69:9. “Passion for God’s house burns within me.” That outburst of temper was seen as spilling over in a zeal that sought to not just destroy the system but restore the people to God. Yet another translation of that verse is also telling. “Concern for God’s house will be my undoing.”
Restorative Justice
Did anything change that day? In a word, No. After a scramble for livestock and spilled money, the next day the market opened for business as usual. But what would come was spelled out.
When confronted by the Jewish leaders, Jesus retorts with this incomprehensible statement: “Destroy this Temple, and three days later I will raise it up!” Everyone knew the Temple took forty-six years to erect. What ever could be going on in his head?
By this point, Jesus likely was shaking, visibly angry by any observation. Yet, there was an awareness of the connection between that day and what was to come. Whips would be cracked again, but the slashes would be across his own back. Injustice inflicted by every nation, the failings of priests and people, not to mention his own rigged trial and betrayal by friends, would be absorbed into himself. As Son of God, he would bear the worst the world could design on a cross and know fully what it means to be separated from God as Father. With that act, the divine would relinquish its anger in exchange for restoration.
Three days later, Jesus said, and he delivered. After that, no other sacrifice is required. Priests can point the way, but only a soul accepting of God’s love is necessary. No government or other human institution or system can interfere. He bore a fury that refused to let any injustice or dysfunction get in the way. In him resides the place of true worship.
Three days later Jesus’ temple-body rose from a zealousness centered in the power of love. Such was his passion.
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