=18, 19. What sign showest thou unto us?= What evidence of authority to expel from the temple practices allowed by the priesthood. They questioned not the right of an inspired prophet to act thus, but the authority of Jesus as a prophet. The moral power before which all quailed was the greatest of signs; but to that they were indifferent. “They required signs to be proved by signs.”--(_Bengel._) No other authority for any reformation is ever required than the power and grace to achieve it. The same question was repeated at the second cleansing, but it elicited a very different answer (Matt. 21:23).--=Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.= In interpreting this passage observe that (1) John himself explicitly declares Christ’s meaning, “He spake of the temple of his body” (ver. 21); (2) that not only the Jews, who might have willfully perverted Christ, misunderstood his meaning, but his own followers did not, till after his death, understand him (ver. 22); hence (3) the hypothesis that he pointed to himself when he said, “Destroy this temple,” is not only unnecessary but improbable. The words are a prophecy, but are purposely left enigmatical, to be interpreted by the event. The temple is itself a type of man, who is intended to be the temple of God, in which he will dwell; and therefore a type perfectly fulfilled only in Christ, in whom alone the Spirit of God dwelt without measure, and with no periods of partial or complete exclusion. The Jews in crucifying Christ destroyed the divine reality of which the building was only a symbol or prophecy; moreover they inaugurated that terrible drama of passion which ended in the literal destruction of the temple itself. For description of this destruction see Matt. ch. 24, Prel. Note. Some objections to this passage have been suggested. (1) _The crucifixion of Christ and his resurrection taking place three years later cannot be a sign of his authority here._ Ans. In fact Christ does not comply with the Pharisees’ demand for a sign but refuses it, as in the analogous passage in Matt. 12:34-40, where he also by a metaphor refers to his resurrection. (2) _The prophecy would not be and in fact was not understood._ Ans. It was not intended to be understood then, but to afford a basis for the faith of the disciples when subsequent history had interpreted it. It was an enigma more likely to be remembered because enigmatical. “Many such sayings he uttered which were not intelligible to his immediate hearers, but which were to be so to those who should come after. And wherefore doth he do this? In order that when the accomplishment of his predictions should have come to pass, he might be seen to have foreknown from the beginning what was to follow.”--(_Chrysostom._) (3) _The language is imperative and thus involves a command by Christ to crucify him._ Ans. The imperative, _Destroy this temple_, is not equivalent to the future, You will destroy this temple; nor is it permissive merely, You