Posted by:
Tevai
(
)
Date: June 23, 2019 04:23AM
From what I can understand (the explanations are complicated, and deal with specific history I am unfamiliar with), the courtyard of the Second Temple (means: in the time of Jesus) functioned as an international bank, where a Jew could pay a local tax, or where animals could be purchased for sacrifice, where funds for what we would call a savings account could be deposited, or where (in a yeasty time and place) diverse international currencies could be changed for the specific local coinage needed (most importantly, as I understand, for Jews to be able to pay that particular tax which applied to Jews only).
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/money-changersI scanned some of the Christian explanations, and (as a Jew), they are confusing because they seem to conflate Jewish realities with Christian apologetics as if they are they same thing, and they're not.
I am not sure I understand any better now than I did fifteen minutes ago, but this will at least get you started.