Cleansing the Temple

15 Then they came to Jerusalem. Jesus entered the temple area and began to drive out those who were selling and buying in the temple courts. He turned over the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves, 16 and he would not permit anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. 17 Then he began to teach them and said, “Is it not written: ‘ My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations’? But you have turned it into a den of robbers!” 18 The chief priests and the experts in the law heard it and they considered how they could assassinate him, for they feared him, because the whole crowd was amazed by his teaching. 19 When evening came, Jesus and his disciples went out of the city.