The Spiritual and Political Lessons of the Transfiguration of Jesus – AMAC

AMAC Exclusive – By David P. Deavel

In our society afflicted with cultural amnesia, it is imperative that we bring to consciousness our memory of the things that still float to the surface but are not recognized or understood. We do this not out of antiquarian interest, but because the hope for the future and the light to act in that future are found in the blessings and examples of the past. For Christians, it is even more true: remembering God’s action in the past is the way to strengthen faith, to persevere and to guide faithful behavior. So, it’s right and proper to take a moment to learn about a holiday that’s officially important to Christians but virtually overlooked. I am referring to the Transfiguration of Jesus, which many Christians celebrated this weekend.

I say “many Christians” because although Roman Catholics, Eastern Rite Catholics, Anglicans and many Eastern Orthodox believers marked this holiday yesterday, August 6, Eastern Orthodox believers who use the old Julian calendar find that August 6 falls on August 19 of the Gregorian calendar. Many Protestant groups dedicate the Sunday before Ash Wednesday to this biblical event, recorded in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke. For the Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholics of the Byzantine tradition, this feast is one of the twelve major feasts of the Church year. It should be so, because it is a kind of sum of supernatural and natural lessons.

The story is told in Matthew 17:1-8; Mark 9:2-8; and Luke 9:28-36. The story is this. Jesus and three disciples, Peter, James and John, go up on a mountain to pray. While there, Jesus suddenly shines with a fiery white light and is seen by the disciples in the midst of Moses and Elijah, who talk to him. When Peter suggests building three cabins for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah, they are immediately enveloped in a cloud and hear a voice saying, “This is my Son, my Chosen; Listen to him!” (Luke 9:35; Revised Standard Version quotes). After these words, the disciples see Jesus alone.

It is a powerful story with its echoes of the Old Testament and hints of what is to come. The name of the high mountain is not given in any of the gospels, but an old tradition dating back to the third-century Egyptian theologian Origen interprets it as Mount Tabor, an apt place since in the Old Testament Book of Judges, chapter four is where Israel defeats a number of Canaanite tribes – a precursor to Jesus’ own defeat against death and evil. Other scholars have proposed other mountains as the true site. One of the most intriguing suggestions is that it was Mount Nebo, the place where Moses saw the Promised Land and died. In any case, it is a mountain – and a mountain was the site of the giving of the Law in the Old Testament, the site of the Temple in Jerusalem, and the site of the fulfillment of Israel’s hopes in the Prophets. – Mount Zion.

In short, wherever that particular mountain was, the very fact of the presence of Moses and Elijah surrounding Christ in the light tells us what is important. Moses represents the law or Torah while Elijah represents the prophets. Luke tells us that these two “appeared in glory and spoke of his going away, which he was to fulfill in Jerusalem” (Luke 9:31). This tells us that the law and the prophets were ultimately about what Jesus was to accomplish with his passion, death and resurrection – a new “going out” or exodus that would bring freedom from bondage, sin and dead.

There is more, however. Moses, whose life ended on Mount Nebo, represents the dead while Elijah, who was taken to heaven in a chariot of fire, represents the living. The message this gives us is clear. Jesus fulfills the Law and the Prophets and is Lord of the living and the dead. If the symbolism doesn’t do it for the reader, the voice of God saying to listen to Christ should.

Peter has had much grief over the millennia for his suggestion to build three tents or cabins after seeing the vision. However, the 20th century theologian Jean Daniélou observed because the Transfiguration of Jesus occurred at the end of the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles, Peter’s suggestion was not so incomprehensible. “The manifestation of the glory of Jesus appears to Peter as the sign that the times of the Messiah have arrived. And one of the qualities of these messianic times was to be the habitation of the righteous in the tents signified by the huts of the Feast of Tabernacles.

Peter was on to the truth, but he hadn’t put it all together yet. This goes to the heart of the lessons for us. Peter, like the rest of the disciples – and everyone else – felt that glory was instantly available. Yet it is not so easy. Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) wrote in the first volume of his classic trilogy jesus of nazareth that the lesson Peter had to learn again in this episode is “that the messianic age is above all the age of the Cross and that the Transfiguration – the experience of becoming light of the Lord and with the Lord – demands that we let us be burned by the light of the Passion and thus transformed.

The very vision of the Transfiguration is a vision of what must be – Christ dazzlingly white, the disciples partaking of that same luminosity, the joining together of the pieces of the past into a future bright with promise. But it is a vision that can only be achieved through suffering and perseverance. All Christians should know this truth in their Christian walk. Becoming conformed to the image of Christ is not complicated; it’s not easy either. It requires being forged in this burning light of Passion and surrendering to the will of God in all aspects of life. It is no coincidence that the late Pope Saint John Paul II published his encyclical on the moral life, Splendor veritatisor “On the splendor of the truth”, the day of the Transfiguration in 1993.

This spiritual lesson is one that should resonate in political and social life. “No pain, no gain” is a lesson accessible even in our natural lives. Success in ordinary tasks is purchased at the cost of difficulty. How much more the common life of citizens and friends. Never mind the lives of the righteous in the age to come – good society requires sacrifice and, indeed, in a fallen world, suffering, for there is an opposition to good both in our society and in us themselves. Famous Solzhenitsyn wrote that “the line that separates good from evil does not run through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either – but through every human heart – and all human hearts”.

Christians and Americans have been going through tough times lately. It can be tempting to lose hope and even faith, especially if we believe (consciously or unconsciously) that fame is bought on the cheap. The Transfiguration reminds us that we must stay focused on Truth and Light, follow each other closely, and sacrifice ourselves if we wish to enter the heavenly city or be an earthly city on a hill.

David P. Deavel is associate professor of theology at the University of St. Thomas (Texas). A senior contributor to The Imaginative Conservative, he is a Novak Prize winner from the Acton Institute and a former Lincoln Scholar from the Claremont Institute. With Jessica Hooten Wilson he edited Solzhenitsyn and American Culture: The Russian Soul in the West (Notre Dame, 2020). In addition to her academic publications, her writing has appeared in numerous journals, including Catholic World Report, City Journal, First Things, Law & Liberty, and The Wall Street Journal. Follow him on Gettr @davidpdeavel.

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