Matthew 21:12

ἐξέβαλεν κ.τ.λ. It is probable that a look of divine authority, the enthusiasm of His Galilæan followers, and the consciousness of wrongdoing on the part of the traders, rather than any special exercise of miraculous power, effected this triumph of Jesus in His Father’s House.

ἀγοράζοντας ἐν τῷ ἱερῷ. The traffic consisted in the sale of oxen and sheep, and such requisites for sacrifice as wine, salt, and oil. The merchandise took place in the Court of the Gentiles.

κολλυβιστής, ‘a money changer,’ for the classical ἀργυραμοιβός, from κόλλυβος, a small coin (Aristoph. Pax, 1200) taken as a fee, hence later ‘rate of exchange.’ Cp. Cic. in Verr. Act II. 3. 78, ‘Ex omni pecunia … deductiones fieri solebant: primum pro spectatione et collybo.’ Κόλλυβος, Hebr. kolbon, is said to be a Phœnician word, which spread with their trade, just as the Genoese or Venetian merchants brought the word agio into general use.

τὰς περιστεράς. The definite article here and in the parallel passage (Mark 11:15) ‘indicates the pen of a narrator, who was accustomed to the sight of the doves which might be purchased within the sacred precincts by worshippers’. [Bp Lightfoot, On a Fresh Revision of the N.T. p. 109.]