Andrew wrote:It is my understanding that the moneylenders et al. in the Temple were making profit off of the sacrificial animals they were selling. Jesus was opposed to the practice in the same way that Luther was opposed to the practice of selling indulgences. Is there reason to believe otherwise?
They were not "money lenders", they were "money changers".
Jews travelled from all over the world to be in Jerusalem for the holidays and brought a variety of currency with them. The temple only accepted one form of coin for the temple tax, and the variety of coins would have required either an exchange system or a standardized weight system for metal content.
Ironically, during Jesus' ministry the Sanhedrin voluntarily exiled itself from the temple out into the markets, but the markets voluntarily moved into the temple where they were obviously inappropriate.
PhilosopherJay wrote:
Probably more curious is the Gospel of John NOT mentioning the Temple's destruction. Most everyone agrees John was written a decade or more after the fall of Jerusalem.
There's no reason for John to mention it if the temple was still standing when he wrote his gospel.
Andrew wrote:It is my understanding that the moneylenders et al. in the Temple were making profit off of the sacrificial animals they were selling. Jesus was opposed to the practice in the same way that Luther was opposed to the practice of selling indulgences. Is there reason to believe otherwise?
Common misconception but in fact, according to the Talmud, the money changers were essentially unpaid volunteers compensated only for coinage lost to breakage. The Mishna Shekalim 1:3 documents exactly how every shekel was sent, how skimming was prevented (lots of witnesses for all handling and transportation of money), and compensation for moneychangers.
There was also a 'surcharge' for each Shekel paid (1/6 or 1/12 of a denarius) "as compensation to the temple's Skekels-collectors to reimburse them for any loss incurred in changing the shekels or half shekels into or out of other money.
-Herbert Danby, The Mishna, page 153, note 1 to Shekalim 1:6).
The money changers just exchanged Roman coins (unacceptable in the Temple because they had Caesar's image on them) for Tyrian Shekels, which were then used basically as token to by animals for sacrifice. They were low level functionaries not personally profiting.
Diogenes the Cynic wrote:Common misconception but in fact, according to the Talmud, the money changers were essentially unpaid volunteers compensated only for coinage lost to breakage. The Mishna Shekalim 1:3 documents exactly how every shekel was sent, how skimming was prevented (lots of witnesses for all handling and transportation of money), and compensation for moneychangers.
The Talmud also claims that Jesus was tried in absentia, that a "crier" went out for 40 days soliciting anyone who could witness in favor of Jesus, and then that he was stoned, wait no, hung.
I hope you can have enough sense to understand that the temple was a lavishly prosperous affair and all involved profited. It's pretty ridiculous to assume otherwise.
Understood. Even so, if they were in the Temple, they would have been in the Court of Gentiles, which was supposed to be a place of worship, right? Jesus would have been justified in his actions if that was the case.
Andrew wrote:Understood. Even so, if they were in the Temple, they would have been in the Court of Gentiles, which was supposed to be a place of worship, right? Jesus would have been justified in his actions if that was the case.
And isn't that why he wasn't arrested?
3,000,000 Jewish pilgrims in the city looking to conduct business, and they're forced to do it inside the cramped temple rather than common sense placing the markets in the Kidron Valley, at the gates or even outside the walls (where, by the way, the temple can't control them)?
Diogenes the Cynic wrote:Common misconception but in fact, according to the Talmud, the money changers were essentially unpaid volunteers compensated only for coinage lost to breakage. The Mishna Shekalim 1:3 documents exactly how every shekel was sent, how skimming was prevented (lots of witnesses for all handling and transportation of money), and compensation for moneychangers.
The Talmud also claims that Jesus was tried in absentia, that a "crier" went out for 40 days soliciting anyone who could witness in favor of Jesus, and then that he was stoned, wait no, hung.
You're comparing totally different books written at different times and you're assuming the passage you're talking about is even the same Jesus or that it can't be the more accurate account even if it is the same Jesus. This is not a rebuttal to the Mishna.
I hope you can have enough sense to understand that the temple was a lavishly prosperous affair and all involved profited. It's pretty ridiculous to assume otherwise.
No, it benefited a few. Most people involved didn't get much of anything, Even rank and file priests lived hand to mouth. The money changers were doing nothing wrong. Attacking the money changers was like attacking the volunteers who sell tokens at church carnivals. It was not a purification of the Temple, but a negation of the Temple altogether. An attempt to stop the sacrifices from happening by clogging up the apparatus. Motivations are speculative, but Jesus and John the Baptist both share parallels to the Essenes, who were a decidedly anti-Temple group who thought that Herod's Temple was illegitimate and would nor sacrifice at at it (replacing sacrifice with baptism and with the "body" of its own community).
In any case, if the Temple was corrupt at the top, the money changers were not benefiting from it. They were unpaid nobodies selling tokens.
Andrew wrote:Understood. Even so, if they were in the Temple, they would have been in the Court of Gentiles, which was supposed to be a place of worship, right? Jesus would have been justified in his actions if that was the case.
Diogenes the Cynic wrote:Common misconception but in fact, according to the Talmud, the money changers were essentially unpaid volunteers compensated only for coinage lost to breakage. The Mishna Shekalim 1:3 documents exactly how every shekel was sent, how skimming was prevented (lots of witnesses for all handling and transportation of money), and compensation for moneychangers.
The Talmud also claims that Jesus was tried in absentia, that a "crier" went out for 40 days soliciting anyone who could witness in favor of Jesus, and then that he was stoned, wait no, hung.
You're comparing totally different books written at different times and you're assuming the passage you're talking about is even the same Jesus or that it can't be the more accurate account even if it is the same Jesus. This is not a rebuttal to the Mishna.
I hope you can have enough sense to understand that the temple was a lavishly prosperous affair and all involved profited. It's pretty ridiculous to assume otherwise.
No, it benefited a few. Most people involved didn't get much of anything, Even rank and file priests lived hand to mouth. The money changers were doing nothing wrong. Attacking the money changers was like attacking the volunteers who sell tokens at church carnivals. It was not a purification of the Temple, but a negation of the Temple altogether. An attempt to stop the sacrifices from happening by clogging up the apparatus. Motivations are speculative, but Jesus and John the Baptist both share parallels to the Essenes, who were a decidedly anti-Temple group who thought that Herod's Temple was illegitimate and would nor sacrifice at at it (replacing sacrifice with baptism and with the "body" of its own community).
In any case, if the Temple was corrupt at the top, the money changers were not benefiting from it. They were unpaid nobodies selling tokens.
Then let me school you in business.
When 3 million people converge on a city that is only 1/4 square mile inside the walls, you can bet that there will be money changers in every quarter, in the gates, outside the walls, along the roads, and even showing up in Galilee to collect that Tyrian shekel (as the gospels state) to collect the temple tax in advance of the holiday. The demand for currency exchange was that great and no one could have prevented it.
The only reason why they were inside the temple as well is due to the obvious affiliation with the family of Anas who controlled the temple industry for several decades.
(And YOU think there was no profit motive just because some wishful-thinking rabbi waxing religious 500 years after the fact said so?)
Mental flatliner wrote:[Then let me school you in business.
This is a non-sequitur with regard to the specific role of the money changers in the Temple. What part of "they did not get paid" do you not understand?