These things, I believe, I have done necessarily, even though I have gone on rather at length beyond the exact wording of the evangelists, for the sake of setting forth the discrepancy according to the letter: the three [Synoptics] speaking, with reference to one and the same visit of the Lord to Jerusalem, of things which most people suppose to be the same as what is also written by John; whereas John reports the things set forth as having occurred during two visits of the Lord to Jerusalem, separated by many intervening deeds and occurring on different occasions.
I, then, suppose it impossible for those who understand nothing beyond the [literal] history in these matters to show that the apparent discrepancy is [in fact] in harmony. But if anyone supposes that we have not grasped this soundly, let him write a reply, intelligently, to this our declaration.
XXIII. As for the things that move us toward agreement on these matters, having asked of him who gives to everyone who asks and who strives eagerly to seek, and knocking that the hidden things of Scripture may be opened to us by the keys of knowledge, we shall set forth [our view] in the same manner, according to the power given to us. And first let us look at the wording of John, beginning from 'And Jesus went up to Jerusalem.' Jerusalem, then, is—as the Lord himself teaches in the Gospel according to Matthew—the city of the great King, not situated in a valley or somewhere low, but built upon a high mountain; and 'mountains are round about her,' whose 'fellowship is together as one'; and 'there the tribes of the Lord went up, a testimony to Israel.'
But this city is also called Jerusalem, into which no one on earth ascends or enters; and every soul that has a natural elevation and a keenness of insight into intelligible things is a citizen of this city. And it is possible even for the Jerusalemite to be in sin; for it is possible even for those of the noblest nature to sin, if they do not turn back after sinning more quickly, thereby destroying their good nature, and become not only sojourners in but even enrolled citizens of one of the cities foreign to Judea.
Jesus, then, goes up to Jerusalem after having helped those in Cana of Galilee and having gone down to Capernaum, in order that he might do in Jerusalem the things that are written. He found, then, in the temple—which is also said to be the house of the Savior's Father, that is, in the Church, or in the profession of the sound and healthy ecclesiastical word—certain persons making the Father's house a house of merchandise.
And Jesus always finds certain persons in the temple. For when, in the so-called church, which is the house of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth, are there not some money-changers sitting, deserving of the blows from the whip of cords made by Jesus, and dealers in coin needing to have their coins poured out and their tables overturned?
And when are there not those who sell for profit the oxen that ought to be kept for the plough, so that, putting their hands to it and not turning back, they might become fit for the kingdom of God? And when are there not those who prefer the mammon of unrighteousness to the sheep that furnish them with the material for their adornment?
And there are always many too who despise the care of the guileless and unmixed doves, deprived of all bitterness and gall—more figuratively so called—betraying [them] for the sake of some wretched gain.
Whenever, then, the Savior finds in the temple, the house of the Father, those selling oxen and sheep and doves, and the money-changers sitting, he drives them out, using the whip he made of cords, together with their merchandise-sheep and oxen; and he pours out the coins as unworthy of being kept together, showing their worthlessness; and he overturns the tables in the souls of the money-lovers, saying also to those selling the doves: 'Take these things hence,' that they may no longer trade in the temple of God.
I think, moreover, that he has also performed a sign deeper than what has been said, so that we may understand these things to have become a symbol that the worship pertaining to that temple was no longer going to be performed by the priests according to sensible sacrifices, nor would the law any longer be able to be kept, even as the bodily Jews might wish.
For once Jesus had cast out the oxen and the sheep, and commanded the doves to be taken away from there, oxen and sheep and doves were no longer going to be sacrificed for long according to the customs of the Jews.
And the coins too are an image of bodily coins that do not bear the stamp of God, destined to be poured out; since the legislation, which seems venerable according to the letter that kills, was destined, once Jesus had come and made use of scourges against the people, to be dissolved and poured out, the oversight being transferred to those from among the nations who believe in God through Christ, and the kingdom of God being taken away from those [Jews] and given to a nation producing its fruits.
But it is also possible for a soul naturally well-endowed in respect of reason to be by nature a temple, since—on account of the reason connatural to it—it stands above the body; into this temple Jesus goes up, in a lowlier manner, from Capernaum which lies below; in it are found the earthly, senseless, and troublesome movements that existed before the discipline received from Jesus, and the things reputed to be good but not truly good—which are driven out by Jesus through the reasoning composed of demonstrative and refutative doctrines, so that his Father's house may no longer be a house of merchandise, but may recover the worship of God, performed according to heavenly and spiritual laws, for the salvation both of itself and of many more besides.
A symbol of earthly things is the ox, for it is a tiller of the soil; of senseless and brutish things, the sheep, since this creature is more slavish than many of the irrational animals; of light and unstable reasonings, the dove; and of the things reputed to be good, the coins.
But if someone stumbles at this explanation because the animals brought into the narrative of Scripture are clean animals, it must be said that the narrative would be improbable if it were reported as having happened according to the history as commonly understood; for in the temple of God it was not possible for it to be reported that a herd of animals other than the clean ones had entered, nor for trade in anything other than what was to be sacrificed.
Therefore the evangelist, as I think, made use of what was done by the merchants at the times of the Jewish feasts, when they brought these animals into the outer enclosure of the temple, availing himself also of a thing that had actually happened.
And yet whoever is concerned with a more precise examination will consider whether it was in keeping with Jesus's standing in this life — being reckoned the son of a carpenter — that he should have dared to do so great a thing as to drive out a multitude of merchants, when so great a people had come up for the feast, selling sheep to be slaughtered by their families' households, numbering many myriads, and oxen to be sold to the wealthier who had made such vows, and doves too, which many, as if at a festival gathering, would be buying to feast upon; and as for the money-changers … [whether they would] not accuse Jesus of insolence upon seeing their money poured out and their tables overturned.
And who, being struck and driven out with a whip of cords by one considered among them of little account, would not have seized hold of him and cried out and taken justice into his own hands — especially having so great a multitude who thought themselves likewise insulted, ready to act together against Jesus?
Let us consider whether the Son of God taking up cords and plaiting for himself a whip for the purpose of driving people out from the temple does not exhibit, besides self-will and excessive boldness, also disorderliness.
But one refuge for a defense against these objections remains for one who wishes to preserve the historicity of the narrative: the more divine power of Jesus — that he was of such a kind, when he willed, both to quench the kindled wrath of enemies, and to prevail by divine grace over multitudes, and to scatter troubling thoughts; for 'the Lord scatters the counsels of the nations, and brings to nothing the thoughts of peoples; but the counsel of the Lord abides forever' — so that of none of the things done very boldly by him, which through their divinity summoned those who beheld them to faith, does the account of this incident — if indeed it too actually happened — exhibit a lesser power at work.
And it is possible to declare it even greater than what happened concerning the water in Cana of Galilee that was changed into wine, in that there the matter that was transformed was inanimate, whereas here the ruling faculties of so many myriads of people were subdued.
It should be noted, however, that at the wedding the mother of Jesus is said to be present, and Jesus and his disciples are said to have been invited; but as for the going down to Capernaum … no one but Jesus alone is recorded [as going up to Jerusalem].
But the disciples too appear later on as being present, since indeed they remembered that 'the zeal of your house will consume me.' And perhaps Jesus was, in each of the disciples, going up to Jerusalem; and that is why it is not said, 'Jesus went up to Jerusalem, and his disciples,' as it was said, 'He went down to Capernaum, he and his mother and his brothers and his disciples.'
Now we must consider the passages found in the other evangelists that are akin to this place, concerning those who made the temple a house of trade being cast out from it.
But before these things he narrates the matter of the donkey and the colt, taken at the Lord's command, found by two disciples sent by him from Bethphage into the village opposite it, where the donkey previously tied up is also loosed by the two disciples, having been commanded, if anyone should say anything to them, to answer that 'their Lord has need of them'; and immediately he sends them off.
And he reports that through these things happening the prophecy was fulfilled which says: 'Behold, your king comes, meek, and mounted on a donkey and a colt, the foal of a beast of burden' — which we find in Zechariah.
And when the disciples had gone and done as Jesus commanded them, they brought the donkey and the colt. 'They placed,' it says, 'their garments upon them, and the Lord sat upon them' — clearly upon both the donkey and the colt — at which time the greatest part of the crowd spread their garments on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road, the crowds going before and following crying out: 'Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord; hosanna in the highest.'
Yet, when because of these things he had entered Jerusalem, the whole city was shaken, saying, 'Who is this?' The crowds — clearly those going before and following — answered those who asked who he was: 'This is the prophet Jesus, from Nazareth of Galilee.'
And Jesus entered the temple, and cast out all those selling and buying in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those selling doves; and he says to them: 'It is written, My house shall be called a house of prayer; but you make it a den of robbers.'
We shall then ask those who suppose that nothing beyond the history was intended by Matthew in writing the Gospel, what was the pressing need for two of the disciples to be sent into the village opposite Bethphage, in order that, having found a donkey tied up and a colt with her, they might loose them and bring them to him.
And what was worthy of record that happened to the donkey and colt on which he sat, and who had entered the city? And what followed? Zechariah, prophesying concerning the Christ, says: 'Rejoice greatly, daughter of Zion; proclaim, daughter of Jerusalem; behold, your king comes to you, righteous and saving, himself meek and mounted on a beast of burden and a young colt.'
For if this prophecy foretells only what is bodily, as indicated by the evangelists, let those who stand upon the letter preserve for us the sequel of the prophecy, which runs thus: 'And he shall utterly destroy chariots out of Ephraim, and horse out of Jerusalem, and the battle bow shall be utterly destroyed, and there shall be abundance and peace out of the nations; and he shall have dominion over the waters as far as the sea, and the outlets of the rivers of the earth,' and so forth.
It must be known, however, that Matthew did not set forth the wording as it stands in the prophet. For instead of 'Rejoice greatly, daughter of Zion; proclaim, daughter of Jerusalem,' he has made it: 'Tell the daughter of Zion,' abridging the prophetic text; and he passed over in silence also 'righteous and himself saving'; and, having said, as it stands in the prophet, 'meek and mounted,' instead of the prophet's 'upon a beast of burden and a young colt' he wrote: 'upon a donkey and a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.'
And the Jews too, comparing the sequence of the prophecy with what has been recorded concerning Jesus, press us with objections not to be lightly dismissed, demanding how Jesus destroyed the chariots out of Ephraim and the horse out of Jerusalem, and destroyed the battle bow, and did the things that follow. So much, then, concerning the prophecy.
But if they should blame the length of the journey, finding nothing worthy of the dispensation of the Son of God in the account concerning the donkey and the colt, then, in the first place, appealing to the fifteen stades as being a short distance, they will not bring forward a very reasonable defense regarding the journey; and secondly, let them tell us how he had need of two animals for so short a journey.
For it says, 'He sat upon them'; and further, 'If anyone says anything to you, you shall say that their Lord has need of them; and immediately he sends them off.' I do not think this is worthy of the greatness of the divinity of the Son of God, so as to say that such a nature confesses to having need of a donkey being loosed from its bonds, and a colt coming with it; for everything of which the Son of God has need must be great, and worthy of his goodness.
Besides these things, the very great crowd spreading his garments on the road — with Jesus tolerating this and not rebuking them, as is clear from what is found in the other evangelists: 'If these are silent, the stones will cry out' — I do not know whether this does not display a certain foolishness on the part of one who rejoices at such things, if nothing else is indicated by them; and the branches cut from the trees and spread on the road, as the donkeys were passing through, would seem rather to be an obstacle to the one so encumbered than a reasoned acceptance.
For in the Gospel according to John, he casts out those buying; but Matthew says that he 'cast out all those selling and buying in the temple' — and, as is likely, the number of those buying was far greater than those selling.
And let us note whether the casting out of all those selling and buying in the temple was not, in fact, beyond the standing of one supposed to be the son of a carpenter — unless, indeed, as we said there too, he subjected them all by a more divine power — objections more difficult, so far as concerns the other evangelists, than what is heard from John.
For John says it was said to them by Jesus: 'Do not make my Father's house a house of trade'; but according to the others they are convicted of having made the house of prayer 'a den of robbers' — the house of the Father not admitting of becoming a den of robbers, but only being so far confounded by sinners as to become a house of trade.
Only the house of prayer, when not altogether being the house of the Father, if neglected, will also admit robbers — not becoming their house, but a den, a thing not made by architectural and rational skill.
To see, then, how these things stand belongs to the true mind given to those who say, 'But we have the mind of Christ' — that we may see the things graciously given to us by God, which we are persuaded are greater than what is according to us.
For neither is our ruling faculty undisturbed, nor do we have such eyes as ought to be the eyes of the beautiful bride of Christ, concerning which the bridegroom says: 'Your eyes are doves' — perhaps hinting at the perceptive power of spiritual persons, because the Holy Spirit also came upon the Lord Jesus, and upon the lord that is in each person, as a dove. But nevertheless, even being in such a condition, we shall not shrink back, but, feeling our way among the words of life that have been spoken, we shall attempt to lay hold of the power that flows from them upon the one who touches them with faith.
Jesus, then, is the Word of God, who enters the soul called Jerusalem, mounted on the donkey loosed from its bonds by the disciples — I mean by the simple letters of the old covenant, made clear by the two disciples who loose them: the one who leads up what is written to the healing of the soul and allegorizes it for the soul's benefit, and the one who sets forth the good and true things to come by means of what lies in the shadow.
But he is also mounted on the new colt, the new covenant; for in both it is possible to find the word of truth that purifies us and drives out all the thoughts buying and selling within us.
But he does not come alone into the soul called Jerusalem, nor even with only a few; for many things that go before the Word of God who perfects us must come to be in us, and very many other things that follow him — all of them, however, hymning and glorifying him, and setting their own adornment and garment beneath him, so that his mounts may not touch the earth, having the one who came down from heaven resting upon them.
But in order that the old and new words of the scriptures which carry him may be still further above the earth, branches must be cut from the trees, so that they may tread upon things reasonably laid out before them. And the crowds going before and following him can also signify the angelic cooperations — some preparing his way in our souls, by which they themselves are adorned, others following upon his presence in us, concerning which, having spoken often, we now have no need of testimonies for this.
And perhaps it is not unreasonable to liken to a donkey the word that leads the surrounding utterances into the soul; for the donkey is a beast of burden, and a heavy load and burden is indicated by the scriptural wording, especially the older wording, as is clear to one who attends to what was done by the Jews.
But the colt is not a beast of burden in the same way as the donkey. For although every burden of the letter is heavy for those unable to receive the uplifting and lightest burden of the spirit, nevertheless the new letter has a lesser weight than the older one.
I know some who have understood the donkey that was tied up as those who believe from among the circumcision, being released from many bonds by those who have been genuinely and spiritually discipled by the word; and the colt as those from the nations, unrestrained before they received the word of Jesus, and, apart from any yoke laid upon them, having become given to unruliness and love of pleasure.
But even though these interpreters have not spoken of the crowds going before and following, it is not implausible to apply those going before to Moses and the prophets, and those following after to the holy apostles, all of whom enter into the city Jerusalem — so far as must be inquired into according to this account — which has many who sell and buy being driven out by the Son of God.
And perhaps the Jerusalem above, into which the Lord will go up, guiding those who believe from the circumcision and from the nations, with either prophets and apostles going before him and following, or the angels who minister to him — for these too can be signified by those going before and following him — is now spoken of as the city which, before his ascent, had what are called 'the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places,' or the Canaanites and Hittites and Amorites and the rest of the enemies of the people, and, in short, the aliens — the prophecy being able to be fulfilled there in some way, which says: 'Your land is desolate, your cities are burned with fire; strangers devour your land in your presence.'
For these are the ones who defile the heavenly house of the Father, the holy Jerusalem, the house of prayer, and have made it a den of robbers — robbers of none other than themselves — possessing counterfeit silver and giving obols and small change to those who approach, cheap and contemptible coins.
These are the ones who, in wrestling with souls, take from them the more precious things, and plunder the better things, in order to give in return things worth nothing.
And the colt too is found with her, since both were lost before Jesus — I mean those from the circumcision and those from the nations who believed later.
But how these are again immediately sent away after Jesus, having sat upon them, has gone up to Jerusalem, is not without danger to state, for it touches upon the mystical matter of the transformation of the saints into angels, who will be sent forth in the age after this one, in a manner similar to the ministering spirits sent for service on account of those who, according to these things, are about to inherit eternal life.
But if the donkey and the colt are the old and the new letter, on which the Word of God is carried, it will not be very difficult to show how they are sent away once the Word has appeared in them, and they do not remain — after the Word has entered Jerusalem — in those who have cast out all the thoughts that sell and buy.
But I think it is not without purpose that this place, where the donkey and the colt were tied, is a village, and this without a name; for the whole earth, where the donkey and the colt tied up are, is a village in comparison with the whole world that is in heaven, and the village is sufficiently called without the addition of any other name.
But Matthew says that those who were to receive the donkey and the colt were sent from Bethphage, a place which was priestly, and is interpreted 'house of jaws.'
These things, then, must be said, according to our ability, concerning what is in Matthew, the complete and more precise account, beyond these things, to be stated more opportunely when it is granted to us to speak on the Gospel according to Matthew.
But Mark and Luke say that a colt tied up, on which no one of men had yet sat, was found by the two disciples according to the Lord's command, which, having loosed, they brought to the Lord.
But Mark adds that they found the colt tied at a door outside, on the street corner. But who are those outside? Those from the nations, who were strangers to the covenants and aliens to the promise of God, resting on the street corner and not under a roof or house, bound by their own sins and loosed by the aforementioned twofold knowledge of the acquaintances of Jesus.
But the bonds of the colt that was tied, and the sins committed against the sound word — being convicted by him who is the door of life, in relation to that door (I mean the door itself) — were not within, but outside; for perhaps within the door a bond of wickedness cannot come to be.
But some stand by the tied colt, as Mark says — I think those who had tied it; and as Luke records, 'The owners of the colt said to the disciples, Why do you loose the colt?' For the lords who subjected and bound the one who had sinned are lawless ones, who are not able to look the true Lord in the face as he draws the colt away from their bond.
When, then, the disciples say, 'Its Lord has need of it,' the wicked masters being unable to answer anything, the disciples lead the colt to Jesus naked, casting their own adornment upon it, so that the Lord, sitting upon the garments placed there by the disciples, might rest.
The remaining points, from what has been said concerning Matthew, will not be very obscure: in what manner they come into Jerusalem, and 'entering the temple he began to cast out those selling and buying in the temple,' or, 'As he drew near, seeing the city, he wept over it. And entering the temple he began to cast out those who were selling.'
For in some who have the temple within themselves he casts out all those selling and buying in the temple; but in others, who do not obey the word of God so completely, he only makes a beginning of casting out those selling and buying; and there are third ones besides these, in whom he began to cast out only those selling, but not also those buying.
But those in John are all cast out together, along with the sheep and the oxen, by the whip plaited out of cords. Attend carefully, if it is possible, to see how the variations of what is written and the discrepancies are resolved according to the manner of the anagogical interpretation, each of the evangelists describing different activities of the word in different characters of souls, souls accomplishing not the same things but certain similar ones.
And the seeming interruption of Jesus's ascents to Jerusalem, in the evangelist who has recorded the Gospel now in hand, differently from the three others, can be preserved only in this way, as we have set forth their wording: John, having come upon similar matters, says that, instead of the branches cut from the trees and the leafy boughs from the fields spread on the road, the great crowd that had gone out to the feast took the palm branches of the date-palms, and went out to meet him, crying out: 'Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel.'
Yet this evangelist says that the little donkey, upon which the Christ sits, is found by Jesus himself, setting forth something more concerning the little donkey signified more figuratively — namely, that it received a greater benefit, a benefit that came not from men nor through men, but through Jesus Christ.
Nor did John set forth the prophetic text word for word either, but instead of it, 'Do not fear, daughter of Zion; behold, your king comes, sitting …' instead of 'mounted … upon the colt of a donkey … upon a beast of burden and a young colt.' But 'Do not fear, daughter of Zion' is not stated at all in the other evangelists.
Yet let us see, since the prophetic word has been set forth by all the evangelists in some form, whether it is not necessary for the daughter Zion to rejoice greatly, while the daughter Jerusalem, who is superior to her, must not only rejoice greatly but also proclaim, since her king is coming, the righteous and saving and meek one, by his having mounted the beast of burden and the young colt.
Everyone, then, who receives him will no longer fear those of heterodox opinion armed with plausible arguments — called the 'chariots of Ephraim,' destroyed by the Lord — nor the false horse of salvation, the lustful desire made akin to sensible things, a desire which harms many of those wishing to dwell in Jerusalem and to attend to the sound word.