Matthew 12:6

“But I say to you, that one greater than the temple is here.”

But Jesus now takes the opportunity of making a second point so as to bring home to them His claims. He points out that ‘One greater than the Temple is here'. Note His emphatic ‘I say to you'. He is speaking from a position of unique authority. The words are carefully chosen. He did not precisely say that He was the One Who was greater than the Temple. He left it to be implied. But again the claim is huge. He is indicating that He is greater than the Temple, that His importance outranks the importance of the Temple, and that He thus has the right to interpret the Law as it applies to His followers, just as the Temple could interpret the Law for its ministrants. Indeed as the Temple is the repository for the Law, it has authority over the Law. So as greater than the Temple He has more right to interpret the Law than any other living person. It was in fact to be one of the duties of the Messianic King to interpret the Law so as to ensure that he and the nation lived by it (Deuteronomy 17:19).

‘One greater than the Temple.' ‘One' is neuter, but in Greek this can signify a person when a quality is being stressed rather than the person himself (compare the similar use in Matthew 12:41). Alternately what is greater than the Temple might be the Kingly Rule of God, but that would then include the King (Matthew 12:28).

‘Is here.' In other words let them note that the time has come. For long centuries the Temple has represented God on earth. But now it has been superseded as God's primary means of being revealed to His people, by Another, the One Who can reveal the Father to whom He will (Matthew 11:27), or alternately by the presence of the Kingly Rule of Heaven, and the One Who represents it. Thus the Tabernacle and the Temple as the place around which God's ‘congregation' would gather is being replaced by Another around which a new congregation will gather.

Jesus comparison of Himself with the Temple comes out elsewhere. See Matthew 26:61; John 2:19. Just as within the Temple was the symbol of the Ark of the Covenant of YHWH (not the Ark itself but something that represented it) so within the body of Jesus was the living God Himself.