Throughout this Trinity Season, we have been
exercising ourselves, striving, by divine grace, in the work of our
conversion: which involves the turning of our vision and of our love
heavenwards, to that beauteous splendour which illumines all of our
darkness; and which entails the purifying of our minds and hearts
from whatever does not reflect the glory of God, from any tarnish of
the divine image in which we have been created. With our eyes thus
uplifted, while now we see only as in a glass, darkly, our hope is
to be transformed into this glorious likeness, that we may see our
Saviour face to face, and behold him as he is.
On this Feast of the Transfiguration, we
celebrate the manifestation of divine glory in the transfigured body
of Christ our Lord, which is nothing less than the revelation in
mystery of his divine sonship: “and his face did shine as the
sun, and his raiment was white as the light . . . and behold
a voice out of the cloud, which said, ‘This is my beloved Son, in
whom I am well pleased” (Matt. 17:2, 5). Peter, James and John
were, on that day on mount Tabor, witnesses of the light and glory
of Christ. Now it is for us to consider in what sense this
manifestation of light a mystery. And how does this mystery pertain
to us, to our vocation of holy living and holy dying?
When Jesus’ glory shone forth and was beheld by
the three, St Matthew records that “there appeared unto them
Moses and Elijah talking with him” (Matt. 17:3). By which he
means: the Law, the Prophets, and the Gospel are here sharing a
conversation. For the Law was received by Moses; singularly among
the Prophets, Elijah ascended into heaven in a fiery chariot; and of
course the transfigured Christ, that “true Light which lighteth
every man that cometh into the world” (John 1:5, 9) is himself
the Gospel. But the voice from heaven makes emphatically clear that
these three are decisively not equal dialogue partners.
Scripture indeed reveals God’s glory and salvation to the human
race, yet the unity of God’s Word written consists in one figure;
all and each of its parts witness to one focal point which
undergirds the whole, which is manifest in the voice from heaven: “Hear
ye him” (Matt. 17:5). That is to say: “All scripture is
perceived in a new light by the soul which is open to the gospel and
adheres to Christ. All scripture is transfigured by Christ” (de
Lubac, “Spiritual Understanding”).
Yet we must probe deeper: for there is no
illumination, no spiritual understanding even, which does not come
from Christ. Contrary to the doctrine of our age, moral law—if we
may be permitted to recognise moral law—is not a matter of
‘what I feel is true;’ truth is not something which ‘might be true
for you but isn’t true for me;’ it is not a private
affair which admits of contradiction and change and variability,
according different circumstances, times and places. It is not a
matter of private interpretation. Rather, truth is one. We may
perhaps find it, in part, outside of our canon of Sacred Scripture,
just as in the Middle Ages the coming of Christ was found in the
Latin poetry of the pagan, Virgil; we may find it among secular
learning, just as in the fourth century St Augustine’s prayers and
affections were changed by reading the philosophy of the pagan,
Cicero. But this is because all knowledge is divine illumination;
and all truth, ultimately, belongs to Christ, the divine logos.
The brightness and glory of Christ which shines forth from his
transfigured face scatters the darkness of the world, and floods
with its bright beams the dimness of our mortal understanding.
But the mystery of the transfiguration goes still
deeper than this. For in the light of the transfigured Christ is
comprehended the mystery of our very judgment, and conversion: for
his light searches the dark and secret shadows of our hearts. The
disciples, having seen the vision of Christ’s glory, having heard
the voice of God from out of the cloud, “fell on their face, and
were sore afraid” (Matt. 17:6). It is only in the vision of God
that we come to see ourselves as we truly are. In the
dazzling light of Christ’s glory, we come to recognize, first of
all, our own darkness of soul, weakness, iniquity and wretchedness,
how far indeed we are from our source of being and life, and our
inability to sustain and enjoy the vision of God by our own effort.
As St Augustine puts it, “When I first came to know you, you raised
me up to make me see that what I saw is Being, and that I who saw am
not yet Being. And you gave a shock to the weakness of my sight by
the strong radiance of your rays, . . . And I found myself far from
you” (Confessions, VII.x.16). True self-knowledge, and thus
true knowledge of God, is only attained when we come to know
ourselves as we are known, and judged, by God. In the
frailty of our nature, we who are “not worthy to gather up the
crumbs under thy table,” should rightly come to our knees in
humility of spirit, full of fear and wonder and ecstasy before the
splendour of God’s majesty. For we cannot bear to gaze on
such a great glory. As the Lord declared to the Israelites, “Man
shall not see me and live” (Ex. 33:20).
Yet the bright beams of Christ are also our
heavenly comfort: if we are to be lifted up to true being and life,
we must come to know and embrace God anew in the divinity become
weak who alone can raise and lift us up to himself. “And Jesus
came and touched them, and said, Arise, and be not afraid. And when
they had lifted up their eyes, they saw no man, save Jesus only”
(Matt. 17:7, 8).
Christ reveals to us our real human condition,
the truth about ourselves, and what humanity truly is: we through
our fall disfigured our nature, and caused its original
resplendence to be forgotten, lost. Yet God in his mercy
condescended to take our nature upon himself: Jesus Christ, “God, of
God; Light, of Light; Very God, of very God” (BCP, 71),
humbled himself by taking on the flesh of our humanity, that we
might ascend to the divine. His transfigured glory shows us what we
once were and what we shall be again if we come to him, and are
transformed into his likeness from glory to glory. To contemplate
the vision of the transfiguration is a foretaste of heaven on earth,
and by fixing our gaze upon Christ’s glorified body we are
strengthened inwardly by his grace to follow him to Jerusalem, in
self-denial, suffering, death, and the resurrection to life
everlasting.
Let us, then, come to Jesus, unto his salvific
light, to be enlightened, to be transfigured: that our darkness may
be overwhelmed by his holy and glorious rays; that we may be abased
in the searing light of his judgement, and by his mercy lifted unto
the likeness of his glory; so that “when the Son of Man
shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, [and]
. . . shall . . . sit upon the throne of his glory” (Matt.
25:31) then we may be numbered among his saints, welcomed into the
fullness of his unending joy and light perpetual, adorned with his
celestial glory. Amen.
