"A Cave of Robbers"

JESUS had ample reason to say that greedy merchants had turned God's temple into "a cave of robbers." (Matthew 21:12, 13) To pay the temple tax, Jews and proselytes from other lands had to exchange their foreign money for acceptable currency. In his book The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, Alfred Edersheim explains that money changers used to set up their businesses in the provinces on Adar 15, a month before Passover. Beginning on Adar 25, they moved into the temple area in Jerusalem to capitalize on the tremendous influx of Jews and proselytes. Dealers ran a thriving business, charging a fee for every piece of money exchanged. Jesus' reference to them as robbers suggests that their fees were so excessive that they were, in effect, extorting money from the poor.


Some could not bring their own sacrificial animals. Anyone who did so had to have the animal examined by an inspector at the temple—for a fee. Not wanting to risk having an animal rejected after bringing it a long distance, many bought a Levitically "approved" one from corrupt dealers at the temple. "Many a poor peasant was well fleeced there," says one scholar.


There is evidence that onetime high priest Annas and his family had a vested interest in the temple merchants. Rabbinic writings speak of "the [temple] Bazaars of the sons of Annas." Revenue from the money changers and from the sale of animals within the temple grounds was one of their main sources of income. One scholar says that Jesus' action in evicting the merchants "was aimed not only at the prestige of the priests but at their pockets." Be that as it may, his enemies surely wanted to do away with him!—Luke 19:45-48.