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 XIX.

THE COURT OF THE GENTILES.

Immediately after the miracle at Cana, our Lord went with His Mother, His brethren, and His disciples to Capharnaum, a prosperous commercial town on the north-west coast of the Sea of Galilee.

These brethren of Jesus, so called by Jewish custom, were His near relations, the children of Mary, wife of Cleophas or Alphaeus, and sister or cousin of the Blessed Virgin. They were James, Simon, Jude and Joseph. James and Jude (also called Thaddeus), and perhaps Simon, became Apostles.

They remained at Capharnaum not many days, for the Pasch was at hand, and the caravan from Galilee was starting for Jerusalem. Our Lord joined it, and on His arrival in the Holy City went to the Temple.

It must always have been painful to Him to go there at this time and see what went on within those sacred walls. The lowest and largest quadrangle, the Court of the Gentiles, was like the rest of the Temple, a place for prayer, but at the time of the Pasch it looked like a market. The beautiful cloister and colonnades that ran along the inner side of the Court were filled with oxen, sheep and lambs innumerable. The tables of the money changers, piles upon piles of caged doves, stalls stocked with oil and incense, and whatever was needed for the various sacrifices, blocked up the space in every direction. As Roman subjects the Jews used Roman coins, but when they had to buy anything needed for the service of God, these had to be changed for sacred money. The wrangling that went on over this