1-3. What did Jesus do when he found that the temple was being polluted?

JESUS had great respect for the temple in Jerusalem because he knew what it stood for. The temple had long been the center of true worship on earth. But that worship​—the worship of the holy God, Jehovah—​must be clean and pure. Imagine, then, how Jesus felt when he came to the temple on Nisan 10, 33 C.E., and found that it was being polluted. What was happening?​—Read Matthew 21:12, 13.

² In the Court of the Gentiles, greedy merchants and money changers were taking unfair advantage of the worshippers who came to present offerings to Jehovah.a Jesus “threw out all those selling and buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money changers.” (Compare Nehemiah 13:7-9.) He denounced those selfish men for turning his Father’s house into “a cave of robbers.” Jesus thereby showed his respect for the temple and what it represented. The worship of his Father had to be kept clean!