Jesus was indeed the Prince of Peace, HE was gentle, compassionate and considerate. But he was never timid. Christ showed righteous anger when he arrived at the temple in Jerusalem and started hurling the merchants’ tables and chairs about and screaming at them to leave.
“And they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons; and he would not allow any one to carry anything through the temple. And he taught, and said to them, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.” (Mark 11:15-17)
The “cleansing of the temple” is described in all four Gospels and is a common scene in Christian art.
This painting by El Greco (Domenikos Theotokopolous) was probably painted just before 1570. It depicts a furious Jesus, wielding a whip and driving the moneychangers out of the temple as they flinch and squirm to avoid his blows. It’s a chaotic scene of pain and admonishment.
El Greco—which simply means The Greek—has imagined the temple looking more like an elaborate Italian palace than a sacred place of worship. To Catholics, the image symbolised the expulsion of Protestant heretics to purify the church.