John 2:15

Ver. 15. “ And having made a small scourge of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, both the sheep and the oxen; and he poured out the changers' money and overthrew their tables. ”

This scourge was not an instrument, but an emblem. It was the sign of authority and of judgment. If it had been a matter of performing a physical act, the means would have been disproportionate to the end, and the effect would be even more so to the cause. The material use of the scourge had no place. The simple gesture was enough. Πάντας, all, includes, according to many (comp. Baumlein, Weiss, Keil), only the two following objects connected by τε καί, “all, both sheep and oxen. ” But it is more natural to refer πάντας to τοὺς πωλοῦντας, the sellers, which precedes, and to make of the following words a simple apposition: “He drove them all out, both sheep and oxen. ” The design of the τε καί, as well as, is certainly not to indicate by a lifeless disjoining of parts the contents of the word all, but to express the sort of bustle with which men and animals hastened off at His command and at the gesture which accompanied it. He overturned, with His own hand. Κολλυβιστής, money-changer, from κόλλυβος, nummus minutus. τὸ κέρμα, singular taken in the collective sense.