Introduction
This commentary is coming out a little later this week partially because I’ve been on vacation for a few days but also because I’ve been struggling with where I’m going to go with this text this week.
This is the only time that we get the “the temple incident” (as Karoline Lewis calls it) within the three-year lectionary and its arguably the least understandable. In the Synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), this scene always takes place immediately after Jesus’ (only) entrance into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. In each of the Synoptics it is always after conflict is starting to significantly increase between Jesus and the religious leaders. Jesus’ turning over of the tables and casting out those who are “money changing” is a clear escalation that will alert all the authorities of Jerusalem that there is a rabblerouser causing trouble who needs to be taken care of. Jesus will then hold court in the other Gospels the next day and escalate the conflict and tension even further by answering the questions of the other religious leaders and insulting them openly in front of the crowds. In the Synoptics we can see the tension and the conflict before, during, and after this scene. We’ve been told that the tension is coming (like in last week’s Gospel when Jesus first pronounces his death and resurrection) and it can be argued that this temple scene is the catalyst that forces the hand of the religious leaders to have him arrested.
But today’s version comes from John. And if we look closely, there’s not actually any external conflict around it (outside of the most violent Jesus we see in any of the gospels, fashioning a whip of cords). We are conditioned (because of the Synoptics) to read this version as being full of “passion” conflict and that immediately Jesus is in trouble and moves him toward the cross. But that’s not how the Jewish authorities respond. Instead, they respond with curiosity. They simply ask for a sign for why he is doing this. And Jesus gives a confusing answer about the building being torn down. And the narrator gives us a theological note that it’s about Jesus’ body and his death and resurrection. But because we are conditioned to read conflict into this, we hear their follow up question as foolish, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?” But they don’t follow up with temple guards or soldiers to usher him away, the scene just changes. There’s no immediate consequence or punishment or chase scene. The scene just simply goes on and says, “23When he was in Jerusalem during the Passover festival, many believed in his name because they saw the signs that he was doing. 24But Jesus on his part would not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people 25and needed no one to testify about anyone; for he himself knew what was in everyone.” In fact, this scene and then “the signs that he was doing” inspires even more curiosity when Nicodemus, a religious leader, visits him in 3:1.
Why do I say all of this? Because it is Lent, we’re leading up to Holy Week, and our instinct is going to read conflict into this text. But the conflict is not explicitly there. This is not the synoptics when Jesus will be crucified in just a few days. Instead, this a scene where Jesus’ conflict (and violence) is met with… curiosity?
I want to pause for a second because this text (as well as many others in John) has been used for antisemitic purposes. And while the text may not be full of conflict for Jesus, this text (and the Synoptic parallels) has been used to promote violence against the Jewish people for centuries. This week’s working preacher (by Dong Hyeon Jeong) does good work in addressing how this text should not be used (and was not created) for antisemitic purpose and he has ways of addressing that perspective. I encourage you to read that if you’d like to address that history of this text.[1]
John’s Meaning
So, what’s happening here at the Temple? Gail O’Day and Susan Hylen give great insight into the context of this scene:
“Passover is celebrated in early spring. Large crowds of pilgrims would come to Jerusalem for the festival from all over the region. In the Synoptic Gospels, Jesus only goes to Jerusalem once, at the end of his life. Because John narrates a longer ministry (three years instead of the one year of the Synoptics), Jesus celebrates three Passovers in John. The distances that the pilgrims traveled meant that they could not bring their own animals to sacrifice in the temple but had to buy them there (Pilgrims might purchase cattle, sheep, or doves for the burnt offerings [Lev. 1,3], as well as lambs for the Passover offering.) The temple fees could only be paid in the temple currency, so the money changers were necessary to convert the other currencies that the pilgrims would have with them. In driving all of these merchants out of the temple area, Jesus makes it impossible for pilgrims to make their Passover preparations.”[2]
In the Synoptics, Jesus seems to be scolding some level of malpractice of the moneychangers. Presumably they are charging a significant fee that is unfair to those who are just trying to honor the Passover festival. But that’s not what’s happening in John. Karoline Lewis then reflects on this theologically,
“The vital trades are in place for the necessary exchange of monies, animals, and grains for the required sacrifices. Nothing is out of order at this point…Instead of a concern for the temple malpractices (“den of robbers” [as Jesus calls them in the Synoptics]), Jesus orders that his Father’s house not be made a marketplace. Yet, for the temple system to survive, the ordered transactions of a marketplace were essential. The temple had to function as a place of exchange for maintaining and supporting the sacrificial structures required for preserving a relationship with God. Jesus is not quibbling about maleficence or mismanagement but calls for a complete dismantling of the entire system. Underneath this critique lies also the intimation that the temple itself is not necessary. At the center of such theological statements is the fundamental question of God’s location, which will be confirmed in the dialogue between Jesus and the Jewish authorities.”[3]
Of course, this is a critical and important part of the Christian faith. We see God’s presence in the incarnation of the Word made flesh. God’s presence is not our church buildings or Pastors or Bishops. God’s presence is with us through the incarnation and through presence of the Spirit that is one with us.
But the issue around this text is we insert this Christian perspective onto a time when the temple was standing, and we denigrate our Jewish siblings for temple practices. However, that’s not when John was written. John was written after the destruction of the second temple and written to a community of Jesus believers who still thought of themselves of Jewish–although they may have been excommunicated from their Jewish communities for that belief. John is writing to a community who is asking themselves, “How do we worship God without our temple and our community?”
Karoline Lewis writes, “The promised presence of God would also have been critical for the community to which John was writing. As noted in the Introduction, this was a Jewish group who had been thrown out of their community for their belief in Jesus. To hear that in their excommunication and exile God is present would have been exactly what they needed to hear and would serve to enact, in part, the rhetorical and theological purpose of this Gospel (20:30-31). An essential function of the Gospel of John is to sustain believers in their faith.”[4]
So, how do we preach this?
Preaching Possibilities
The purpose of this text is not to lambaste the temple or temple practices. The purpose is to build up to the big theological claim for a people that need to hear that God is with them.
So, what if we preached that this week? That God is here.
Obligation or Seeking the Presence
Whenever we have big Church days like Christmas, Easter, or baptisms, we often just look at the people that come in as just reluctantly doing their duty. They are just fulfilling their obligation and then they’re gone. In previous generations, that’s how a lot of people talked about year-round churchgoers. People went to church out of a sense of obligation and not out of faith. “It’s just what you did.”
I have a feeling that’s how some folks felt about the festivals in Jerusalem. It’s just people doing their duty. But today we are clearly hearing from a community who is grieving the loss of that connection. Passover wasn’t just an obligatory duty; it was a connection to community and to God.
We learned many interesting things in the height of the pandemic shutdown. From the slow attendance we did learn that some folks were just in the church habit and once the habit was gone, they found other things to fill their time. But we also heard from so many people for whom the church was their community. We heard from people that longed for communion because they’d heard for so long that it was the place of the real presence of Jesus. We heard from people that longed to hear the Word in community because they had heard that the proclamation of scripture was God’s presence among us. Could all of our people articulate those nuanced theological claims exactly? Probably not. But when people are asking for these things because they don’t have access to them, then they are articulating exactly what we are hearing from Johannine community. Sometimes we just need assurance that God is here. In the Word, in the real presence of communion, and just right here around us.
[1] https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/third-sunday-in-lent-2/commentary-on-john-213-22-6
[2] Gail R. O’Day & Susan Hylen, John, WBC, 37-38.
[3] Karoline Lewis, John, 41-42.
[4] Karoline Lewis, 43.
Micah Krey 
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