Purification of the Temple

Christ, twisting in a flash of rose and gold, swings a whip to drive the money-changers and traders from the Temple, their bodies recoiling in a tumble on the left while the disciples watch calmly on the right (John 2:13-16). El Greco returned to this subject again and again across his career, reading it as an image of purification and reform - fitting for the Counter-Reformation. This mature version is in the Frick. He splits the canvas cleanly in two: the violent expulsion of the sinners on the left, the faithful disciples looking on in calm at the right - a divide between the punished and the redeemed that gives the turmoil a clear moral shape.