¹⁶ The priests went into the sanctuary of the Lord to purify it. They brought out to the courtyard of the Lord’s temple everything unclean that they found in the temple of the Lord. The Levites took it and carried it out to the Kidron Valley.^(A)

¹⁶ King Asa also deposed his grandmother Maakah^(A) from her position as queen mother,^(B) because she had made a repulsive image for the worship of Asherah.^(C) Asa cut it down, broke it up and burned it in the Kidron Valley.^(D)

²³ It was necessary, then, for the copies^(A) of the heavenly things to be purified with these sacrifices, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. ²⁴ For Christ did not enter a sanctuary made with human hands that was only a copy of the true one;^(B) he entered heaven itself,^(C) now to appear for us in God’s presence.^(D)

² A tabernacle^(A) was set up. In its first room were the lampstand^(B) and the table^(C) with its consecrated bread;^(D) this was called the Holy Place.^{(E) 3} Behind the second curtain was a room called the Most Holy Place,^{(F) 4} which had the golden altar of incense^(G) and the gold-covered ark of the covenant.^(H) This ark contained the gold jar of manna,^(I) Aaron’s staff that had budded,^(J) and the stone tablets of the covenant.^{(K) 5} Above the ark were the cherubim of the Glory,^(L) overshadowing the atonement cover.^(M) But we cannot discuss these things in detail now.

⁶ When everything had been arranged like this, the priests entered regularly^(N) into the outer room to carry on their ministry. ⁷ But only the high priest entered^(O) the inner room,^(P) and that only once a year,^(Q) and never without blood,^(R) which he offered for himself^(S) and for the sins the people had committed in ignorance.^{(T) 8} The Holy Spirit was showing^(U) by this that the way^(V) into the Most Holy Place had not yet been disclosed as long as the first tabernacle was still functioning.

Jesus Arrested^(A)

18 When he had finished praying, Jesus left with his disciples and crossed the Kidron Valley.^(B) On the other side there was a garden,^(C) and he and his disciples went into it.^(D)

²⁷ “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs,^(A) which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean.

Jesus at the Temple^(A)

¹² Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying^(B) and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers^(C) and the benches of those selling doves.^{(D) 13} “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’^[a](E) but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’^[b]”^(F)

²⁹ I will save you from all your uncleanness. I will call for the grain and make it plentiful and will not bring famine^(A) upon you.

⁷ The priests then brought the ark^(A) of the Lord’s covenant to its place in the inner sanctuary of the temple, the Most Holy Place, and put it beneath the wings of the cherubim.