Note also that in the only gospel where the whip is mentioned, the construction of the weapon is premeditated. He didn’t just grab some leather strips off a table and start swinging; the action in John 2:15 starts specifically when he has made a φραγέλλιον, phrageillon in Greek, more famous in Latin as the flagellum.
φραγέλλιον phragéllion, frag-el’-le-on … a whip, i.e. Roman lash as a public punishment:—scourge. source
A different Greek word is used for ‘whip’ elsewhere in the New Testament; this one only occurs here in John, and in Matthew and Mark to describe the particularly Roman whipping Jesus receives later on.
Anyway, a flagellum is basically a cat o’ nine tails, and has either a braided leather handle or a heavy stick attached to cords with knots. Making one takes a while, and one worth using to drive out the cattle is going to take some chunks out of a moneychanger. Fancy Roman flagella that feature later on in the scripture had hooks and chains, and were sometimes gladiatorial weapons. Castlevania shit.
This has been your regularly scheduled moment of the dad from My Big Fat Greek Wedding. There you go.
As a Christian Anarchist, this is one of my favorite facts.
My dear brother in Christ, not only did our Lord whip the money changers, He took the time to construct the whip and contemplate just how badly He was gonna fuck up those bastards.
I wish churches would teach that to kids braiding lanyards in Vacation Bible School.
And big ups to anyone who goes hard for Tolstoy!
How freaking awesome would that be, man? I grew up on VBS and Kawanis, Wednesday night dinners and Sunday school at Baptist churches in the south. I loved those times, but would never dream of putting my kids (If I’m ever so fortunate) in those same groups because of the awful politics. It would be amazing if there were something like that that taught radical Christianity. We’d live in a different country.
Please don’t conflate markets, products and services with capitalism. That’s yee old liberal con. Capitalism is a modern invention and it’s all about speculation, non-existent liquidity, shell and shelf companies and bringing back usury run amok, what would have people burned at the stake during Jesus times.
Sort of. The part of the story that’s often overlooked is the original emphasis on the sale of animals for sacrifice.
Everyone zeros in on the money changers as if Jesus was worried about FIAT rates, and overlook that it was people selling animals to be sacrificed as sin offerings that was the whole reason the money changers were there in the first place, and then why it’s followed in Mark with a prohibition on carrying things (i.e. sacrifices) through the temple.
And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who were selling and those who were buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves, and he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple.
- Mark 11:15-16
The bit about not carrying things through the temple is noticeably missing from Matthew, despite copying the rest nearly verbatim from Mark.
So while yes, the commercialization of salvation didn’t seem very favorably considered, it may have had more to do with the of salvation part than the commerce part in general.
This attitude is further reflected in the apocrypha too, such as saying 88 of the Gospel of Thomas:
The messengers and the prophets will come to you and give you what belongs to you. You, in turn, give them what you have, and say to yourselves, “When will they come and take what belongs to them?”
Yeah you don’t find Jesus smashing up moneylenders shops in general… just that one time when they were in a temple.
Yeah using Roman currency to purchase animals for sacrifice wasn’t allowed, it first needed to be exchanged for temple currency. The money changers charged fees on top of this, effectively using the temple as a business for themselves. So what was supposed to be a holy place was turned in to a place of bartering and commerce.
Capitalism wasn’t a thing back then but don’t let the subtleties and context of the events stop you from your conclusion that Jesus would not like capitalism because he clearly would not on any level think it is OK.
Noooo, Jesus loves America and guns. Why else would he give Joe football the ability to make a sports point?
yeah based on what Jesus did say about wealth, fair treatment of others and community it is reasonable to deduce that He wouldn’t have been pro capitalist.
Adding on to this.
Oppression of the Poor and Injustice to the Wage Earner are two of the four Sins that Cry to Heaven for Vengeance.
Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.
Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.
Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.
Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.
Jimmy’s 5th chapter.
He also killed a fig tree out of spite when he was hungry but there was no figs on it
