This etching shows the state of pandemonium in the Temple as Christ, in a scene described by all four Evangelists, drives out the moneychangers, wielding a “scourge of small cords” (John 2:15). Christ had found “money changers sitting” in the Temple, as well as those who sold “oxen and sheep and doves.” Rembrandt was sometimes criticized for his lack of decorum in his religious works and here we see a man being dragged across the floor by an ox at the right, while another dives after a dove (lower right). As his bench falls over, a man grasping a bag of money looks up at Christ; at the end of the table change falls to the floor. A dog seems to snarl at Christ himself. Rembrandt borrowed the figure of Christ from Albrecht Dürer’s engraving of the same subject (from the Small Passion); it is a close reverse copy of the earlier printmaker’s design.
