He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a den of robbers!”
ExplanationCommentary
Verse 13. My house shall. That man is a thief, and turns the temple of God into a den of thieves, who makes religion a cloak for his avarice. Of all the innumerable miracles which Jesus performed, none appear greater in my eyes than this: that one man, at that time so contemned and despised, who was afterwards nailed to the tree of the cross, should with his single power be able to expel from the temple that multitude of Scribes and Pharisees, who were so maliciously bent upon his destruction, and so greedy of gain. Something more than human appeared in his celestial countenance on this occasion, and the majesty of the divinity shewed itself in his looks and gestures. Igneum quiddam, atque sidereum radiabat ex oculis ejus, et divinitatis majestas lucebat in facie. S. Jerom.—Hence it is not to be wondered at, if in the utmost fear and consternation they fled away. Menochius.