What Does Mark 11:15 Mean in the King James?
And they come to Jerusalem: and Jesus went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves;
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The disruption reaches both the traders and the machinery of trade: Jesus drives people out and physically turns their tables over.
THE MEANING
The scene meets you now with Jesus entering sacred space and changing what can occupy it: he expels sellers and buyers, then overturns the tables and seats arranged for their trade. The force reaches both the people and the structures that support the exchange.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that an activity becomes untouchable simply because it takes place in a sacred setting; here Jesus enters and dismantles its arrangement.
THE ROOT
κατέστρεψεν
katestrepsen
GROWS FROM
στρέφω (strephō; stem στρεφ-)
To turn or twist.
English “overthrew” can suggest abstract defeat, while the Greek keeps the physical sense of turning things over. The tables and seats are not merely criticized; their arrangement is flipped.
ALSO GROWS
strephō: Turn, twist.
στρέφω
The base verb makes the physical motion audible inside “overthrew.”
epistrephō: Turn toward, turn back.
ἐπιστρέφω
The same root can name a change of direction; here the compound names a literal reversal of the tables.
katastrephō: Overturn, turn upside down.
καταστρέφω
This is the dictionary form of the verb used for the tables and seats.
ἐκβάλλειν
ekballein
GROWS FROM
βάλλω (ballō; stem βαλλ-)
To throw or cast.
The Greek keeps the image of throwing in “cast out.” Alongside the turned tables, it makes the disruption concrete: people are driven out while the furniture of their trade is overturned.
ALSO GROWS
ballō: Throw, cast.
βάλλω
This is the verb at the root of the expulsion.
ekballō: Throw out, drive out.
ἐκβάλλω
The compound used in this verse carries the force of throwing someone outside.
apoballō: Throw away, cast off.
ἀποβάλλω
This related compound preserves the same throwing motion while directing it away.
τραπέζας
trapezas
GROWS FROM
τραπεζ- (trapez-; τραπέζα, trapeza)
Table; in related words, a banker’s table.
A related Greek word, τραπεζίτης (trapezitēs), means banker. In a verse naming moneychangers, that word family makes clear that these tables are part of the working arrangement of exchange, not incidental furniture.
ALSO GROWS
trapeza: Table.
τραπέζα
This is the noun used for the overturned furniture.
trapezitēs: Banker, moneychanger.
τραπεζίτης
The related word links the table family with financial exchange, the activity named in the verse.
THE PATTERN
The Lord’s presence in sacred space confronts what has displaced the place’s purpose.
Even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar; for mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people.And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness.And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, and the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers’ money, and overthrew the tables;THE THREAD
And he taught, saying unto them, Is it not written, My house shall be called of all nations the house of prayer? but ye have made it a den of thieves.The next verse names the house’s purpose as prayer for all nations and says that its occupants have made it a den of thieves. That gives the overturned tables a direct axis: the conflict concerns what the house is being made into.
This reading is from Selah Verse.
You can read any verse this way in the app, keep it as a card, and send it on.
A Bible app where you send verses from your keyboard and in Messages, and every verse has a Deep Dive.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us