The Gospel According to Mark:
A Look at the Son of God

Lesson 11 Jesus Cleanses the Temple
the Gospel According to Mark 11:1–33

Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (RSVCE)*
New American Bible Revised Edition (NABRE)*
Catechism of the Catholic Church
ex libris (in our library)
glossary for the Gospel According to Mark
cross references in the Gospel According to Mark
next lesson: More Parables

This material coordinates with Lesson 11, “Jesus Cleanses the Temple” on pages 52–56 in The Gospel According to Mark: A Look at the Son of God.

Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying,
“The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel.”
—the Gospel According to Mark 1:14–15

welcome to our in-depth study of the Gospel According to Mark
We invite interested groups and individuals to check out the sample introduction and first lesson from this 17-lesson Turning to God’s Word Catholic Bible study based on Scripture that is the source of most of the Sunday Gospel readings for Liturgical Year B. These online study pages link to an online glossary and cross references in the biblical text. Other study aids include maps, additional commentary, and prayers based on the primary Scripture in each lesson. The Gospel According to Mark: A Look at the Son of God and the other two synoptic studies are being submitted for imprimaturs. This study will be available from our website shop about three months before the start of liturgical Year B in 2026. If you have a Bible-related question or comment, click on one of the “ask us your question” or “what do you think” buttons on any online study page.

open with prayer
It’s always wise to begin any Bible study with prayer, whether reading the Scriptures alone or meeting with others in a discussion study group. You can pray using your own words or use one of the opening prayers on our website. We especially like the following:

Lord Jesus, you promised to send your Holy Spirit to teach us all things.
As we read and study your word today,
allow it to touch our hearts and change our lives. Amen.

let’s review—the Gospel According to Mark 10:1–52
In Lesson 10 James & John Seek Glory, Jesus continues to warn his disciples about what he’s going to undergo in Jerusalem, although they fail to understand that Jesus is going to rise from the dead. Jesus also addresses some issues pertaining to obedience and entering the kingdom of God. These include general opposition to divorce and adultery, accepting the faith with childlike simplicity and accepting children as well, trusting in God and placing spiritual wealth above the collection of material goods, and serving others instead of desiring to be served, and the role of faith in healing.

Temple—you could look it up in our archives
The account of Jesus driving the money-changers out of the Temple at Jerusalem is recorded in all four Gospels. At the heart of this story in the Gospel According to John 2:13–22 are two words used to indicate the Temple. To learn more about these words, read Lost in Translation, a weekly online column in which Turning to God’s Word author Matthew Phelps helps readers connect with ideas expressed in the original languages of the Scriptures. New Lost in Translation entries are posted on Mondays, and past entries are archived on our website. Contact us if you’d like to receive Lost in Translation by email every week.

Christian Connection: why was Jesus so upset by commerce in the Temple area?
And more importantly, what should present-day Christians learn from this behavior of Jesus?

?  Consider why the Fourth Gospel places the account of Jesus driving the money-changers out of the Temple so early in Jesus’ ministry when all three of the synoptic Gospels include this story at the beginning of Holy Week.
?  Why might God find activities related to commerce so offensive when they occur within the area of the Temple?
?  Read the Book of Isaiah 56:7 and the Book of Jeremiah 7:11. What point is Jesus making about how the Temple in Jerusalem should be used?
?  What important lesson about worship of God can present=day Christians take away from this account?
?  Think about why the chief priests and scribes in Jerusalem at the time of Jesus were so afraid of Jesus that they were seeking to destroy him.

a reading recommendation about the start of Holy Week
The eleventh chapter in the Gospel According to Mark records events that occurred at the beginning of what now is called Holy Week. Holy Week events recorded in all four Gospels fail to match up exactly, which readers of Scripture can find difficult to reconcile. It will help moving forward to think of the Jewish Passover as similar to the Christian celebration of Christmas, which always occurs on the same date, but not always on the same day of the week. The late Pope Benedict XVI addresses this and other issues of inconsistency in Jesus of Nazareth: Holy Week, a book that looks at decisive events pertaining to Jesus’ last week on earth. The Scripture covered begins with Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem and continues through the time of his Resurrection. You can read excerpts and learn more about the Jesus of Nazareth trilogy (all three books in the Jesus of Nazareth series by the late Pope Benedict) and other works related to Bible study at ex libris—main bookshelf.

authority remains a key issue for the Jews
Although the Jewish religious leaders are focused on learning the source of Jesus’ authority, in the eleventh chapter in the Gospel According to Mark, Jesus seems determined not to tell them. He does however, provide them with a clue when he asks them a related question in the Gospel According to Mark 11:30: “Was the baptism of John from heaven or from men? Answer me.”

?  Consider how this question of Jesus provides an answer to the concerns of the chief priests, scribes, and elders.
?  Why might these Jewish religious leaders have failed to understand what Jesus was saying about the source of his healing power and his power to forgive sins?

the best Catholic commentary about Scripture
To find out more about how Church teaching is supported by passages in The Gospel According to Mark: A Look at the Son of God, check out the Index of Citations in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Links to each lesson’s primary Scripture passages (from the Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition [RSVCE*]) that are cited in relevant paragraphs in the Catechism are provided here. Not every passage in the Gospel According to Mark is referenced in a Catechism paragraph.

the Gospel According to Mark 11:24—paragraph 2610
the Gospel According to Mark 11:25—paragraph 2841

ways our glossary might prove helpful
In addition to providing extra information about geographical locations, our glossary also points out persons or places mentioned in the biblical text under more than one name or more than one spelling. If you can remember a name but aren’t sure in which lesson it shows up, you can find it in the glossary, which lists every proper noun that appears in the biblical text for every lesson in The Gospel According to Mark: A Look at the Son of God. A few general terms also are included that may be unfamiliar or whose meaning may be unclear to readers.

to learn more, read more Scripture
If you’re having difficulty with a particular passage of Scripture, it can be helpful to read the relevant cross references—but looking these up can take time. To make that easier, we’ve compiled the cross references from the Revised Standard Version Second Catholic Edition (RSV2CE)—the translation that we reprint in our study books. A link to that list can be found at the top of every online study page; the list features links to cross references in the primary biblical text in the study book The Gospel According to Mark: A Look at the Son of God.

don’t forget about our indexes & extra online material
If you’re trying to locate information about a specific Scripture passage, you can look it up in the index at the back of the study book. If you want to find a particular commentary, you can look up its title in the topics index. To learn more about another book of the Bible for which there’s a Turning to God’s Word study, visit the online study directories to read the commentaries and watch any accompanying videos. Finally, if you have a question or would like to make a comment about any of our studies, you can use one of the “ask us your question” or “what do you think” buttons to email our authors.

ex libris—Church documents & books about religious topics
Link to magisterial documents referred to in our Bible studies at ex libris—magisterial documents. This listing includes significant recent encyclicals as well as a number of historical Church documents. Recommended books related to Scripture study can be found at ex libris—main bookshelf.

wondering how to pronounce some of these words?
The following link is to a reading from the New International Version (NIV) Bible. To listen, open the link and click on the audio icon above the printed text. Although not taken from the translations used in our study materials, the NIV reading provides an audio guide to pronunciation of words in this lesson’s primary biblical text. A close online version of the translation of the Bible used in Catholic liturgy in the United States as well as an audio guide for daily Mass readings for the current month can be found on the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).

the Gospel According to Mark 11:1—33 (NIV)

round black doveclose with Bible-based prayer related to this lesson
Many of our Catholic study groups like to conclude their discussions with a prayer based on the scriptural focus of their lesson, and some participants include Scripture-specific prayer in their individual study. If you’re uncomfortable composing your own Bible-based prayers, you can follow our four easy steps. If you prefer, you can use the following prayer based on this lesson’s text from the Gospel According to Mark.

O God, you sent your Son Jesus to show men and women 
how best to worship you. Everything Jesus taught, however,
was in fulfillment of the Old Testament prophets who preceded him.
Grant that we who live in the present-day may take seriously
Jesus’ words and teachings about proper worship practices. Amen.

Lesson 12 More Parables—the Gospel According to Mark 11:1—33
Lesson 10 James & John Seek Glory—the Gospel According to Mark 10:1–52

you also may like our study of the book of Genesis
The first seven lessons of In the Beginning: The Book of Genesis, a 28-lesson Catholic Bible study with an imprimatur, provide an in-depth look at the very earliest biblical history—including the two accounts of Creation, events surrounding the Fall of Adam and Eve, the relationship between Cain and Abel, and the baptismal foreshadowing present in the account of Noah and the Flood. Remaining lessons look at lives of the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. Click here to view a sample of the first lesson.

start a Turning to God’s Word Bible study
Thank you for your interest in our three-part study of the synoptic Gospels. More information about beginning a Turning to God’s Word Bible study can be found at start a Bible study, and Tami, Matthew, and I are available to answer questions or discuss concerns. Contact us to start this or one of our other studies or to have your schedule listed with other TtGW study groups on our website. —Jennifer

*There are seven deuterocanonical books in the Old Testament—Baruch, Judith, Sirach, Tobit, Wisdom, and First and Second Maccabees—and there are some deuterocanonical passages in the Books of Daniel and Esther. Protestants usually refer to these works as “apocryphal,” a word that means “outside the (Protestant) canon” because they’re excluded from most Protestant Bibles. Deuterocanonical means “second canon”; Catholics use that word to refer to any section of the Catholic Old Testament for which there are no extant, or existing, Hebrew manuscripts. All of the deuterocanonical books appear in the Septuagint, the earliest remaining versions of which date to the 1st century B.C. This Greek translation of the Old Testament was in common use by Jews at the time of Jesus. Learn more by reading How Do Catholic & Protestant Bibles Differ?

Turning to God’s Word printed Bible studies use the 2006 Revised Standard Version Second Catholic Edition (RSV2CE) translation for all Scripture references except those to the psalms, which are taken from The Abbey Psalms and Canticles, prepared by the Benedictine monks of Conception Abbey and published in 2020 by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). All Scripture links for the online study pages for The Gospel According to Mark: A Look at the Son of God are to the 1966 Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (RSVCE) translation. The New International Version (NIV) audio recordings follow the same chapter and verse numbering as the RSV Catholic translations.

The 1966 RSVCE uses archaic pronouns and verb forms such as “thee,” “thou,” and “didst” in the psalms and in direct quotations attributed to God. The 2006 RSV2CE replaces these with more accessible English. The few significant translation changes in the RSV2CE include rendering almah as “virgin” in the Book of Isaiah 7:14 and restoring the term “begotten” in the Gospel According to John 3:16.

Numbering varies for some passages in this Bible study. Turning to God’s Word studies (print and digital) follow the numbering in the Revised Standard Version Catholic translations (RSV2CE and RSVCE). Discrepancies in the New American Bible Revised Edition (NABRE) are noted in the Index of Scripture Citations in the study book.

You can learn more about the psalms by viewing a sample lesson from the Turning to God’s Word Catholic Bible study Sing a New Psalm: Communicating with God Through the Prayers of the Church. The first volume covers psalms prayed at Lauds and Vespers; the second volume covers psalms prayed at Vigils, Day Prayer, and Compline. Numbering of psalms and verses may vary in different translations.