TRANSFIGURATION (trans-fig-ii-ra'shim). One of the most wonderful incidents in the life of our Savior upon earth, and one so instructive that we can never exhaust its lessons, is the Transfiguration (Matt. xvii :2; Mark ix:2; Luke ix:2g). The Apostle Peter, towards the close of his life, in running his mind over the proofs of Christ's majesty, found none so conclusive and irrefragable as the scenes when he and others were with him in the holy mount, as eye wit nesses that he received from God the Father honor and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, 'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased' (2 Pet. i :17; see also John i :t4). If we divide Christ's public life into three periods—the first of miracles to prove his divine mission, the second of parables to in culcate virtue, and the third of suffering, first clearly revealed and then endured, to atone for sin—the transfiguration may be viewed as his baptism or initiation into the third and last. He went up the mount of transfiguration on the eighth day after he had bidden every one who would come after him take up his cross, declar ing that his kingdom was not of this world, that he must suffer many things, and be killed, etc.
(1) Place. The mount of transfiguration was long thought to have been Mount Tabor ; but as this height is fifty miles from Cesarea Philippi, where Jesus last taught, it is now supposed to have been a mountain much less distant, namely, Mount Herman.
(2) Purpose. The final causes of the trans figuration, although in part wrapped up in mystery, appear to be in part plain. Among its intended lessons may be the following :—First, to teach that, in spite of the calumnies which the Pharisees had heaped on Jesus, the old and new dispensa tions are in harmony with each other. To this end the author and the restorer of the old dispensa tion talk with the founder of the new, as if his scheme, even the most repulsive feature of it, was contemplated by theirs, as the reality of which they had promulgated only types and shadows. Secondly, to teach that the new dispensation was superior to the old. Moses and Elias appear as inferior to Jesus, not merely since their faces did not, so far as we know, shine like the sun, but chiefly because the voice from the excellent glory commanded to hear him, in preference to them. Thirdly, to gird up the energies of Jesus for the great agony which was so soon to ex cruciate him. Fourthly, to comfort the hearts of the disciples, who, being destined to see their master, whom they had left all to follow, nailed to a cross, to be themselves persecuted, and to suf fer the want of all things, were in danger of despair. But by being eyewitnesses of his maj esty they became convinced that his humiliation. even though he descended into the place of the dead, was voluntary, and could not continue long.
J. D. B.