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Bible Dictionaries
Transfiguration
Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament
or Outside the Gospels the Transfiguration is only once directly referred to in the NT, in 2 Peter 1:16 ff., where it is mentioned as showing the credibility of those who preached Christ’s Parousia, seeing that they had been eyewitnesses (ἐπόπται) of His majesty (μεγαλειότης) and had heard the voice; cf. John 1:14, which also would seem to refer, inter alia, to the Transfiguration. Whatever view we take of the authorship of 2 Peter, the passage shows the importance of that event in the eyes of the early Christians. But why does not the writer appeal rather to the Ascension, of which the apostles were equally witnesses? The difficulty is the same, whether St. Peter or some later teacher wrote the Epistle. C. Bigg suggests, with much probability (International Critical Commentary , ‘St. Peter and St. Jude,’ Edinburgh, 1901, pp. 231, 266), that those opponents who denied the Parousia perhaps denied the Resurrection as well, and that therefore it would have been useless for the writer to meet them by blankly affirming the fact of the Ascension; whereas they would acknowledge the truth of the events of our Lord’s ministry. At any rate, the Epistle appeals to an event witnessed by St. Peter. This neither proves nor disproves the Petrine authorship. If the author was St. Peter (whether or not he gave a free hand to the scribe), the reference is natural enough; if he was a later writer wishing to pose as the Apostle, he might equally well introduce a Petrine reminiscence. It seems likely that the author, whoever he was, did not use the Gospel records, or at least not those which we now have. We notice (a) that he says that Jesus received from the Father honour and glory, which is not mentioned in the Gospels; (b) that he uses ‘the excellent glory’ for the ‘bright cloud’ of Matthew 17:5; (c) that he speaks of the holy mountain (the adjective has been thought to betray a later date, when sacred sites might have been held in reverence-but why not in the Apostolic Age?); (d) that he quotes the words of the voice differently from the Synoptists, though he is nearest to St. Matthew; he has εἰς ὃν ἐγὼ εὐδόκησα (an unusual construction) for ἐν ᾧ εὐδόκησα of Matthew 17:5; he omits ‘hear ye him,’ and in Codex B the order of the words is different. He also omits all reference to Moses and Elijah, but this does not affect the question of his source. The probable conclusion from these facts is that the writer, if he was not St. Peter, depended on oral tradition, and this would argue a comparatively early date. It has been noticed that in the context (2 Peter 1:14) we read of St. Peter’s putting off his tabernacle (σκήνωμα) and of his departure (ἔξοδος), which may have been suggested by the σκηναί of Mark 9:5 and ║ Mt. Lk., and the ἔξοδος of our Lord in Luke 9:31, but this is very doubtful. It is possible that there is an indirect reference to the Transfiguration in 2 Corinthians 3:18 (note μεταμορφούμεθα; cf. Mark 9:2, Matthew 17:2), but the reference is to the glory of the Ascended Lord.
A. J. Maclean.
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Transfiguration'. Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdn/t/transfiguration.html. 1906-1918.
