the Week of Proper 28 / Ordinary 33
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Bible Dictionaries
Transfiguration
People's Dictionary of the Bible
or Transfiguration, The. Matthew 17:1-13; Mark 9:2-13; Luke 9:28-36. Though tradition locates the transfiguration on Mount Tabor, there is little to confirm this view, and modern scholars favor some spur of Mount Hermon, Jesus frequently went to the mountains to spend the night In prayer. Matthew 14:23-24; Luke 6:12; Luke 21:37. The apostles are described as heavy with sleep, but as having kept themselves awake. Luke 9:32. Moses the lawgiver and Elijah tie chief of the prophets both appear talking with Christ the source of the gospel, to show that they are all one and agree in one. Luke 9:31 adds the subject of their communing: "They spake of his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem." Among the apostles the three favorite disciples, Peter, James, and John, were the sole witnesses of the scene. The cloud which overshadowed the witnesses was bright or light-like, luminous, of the same kind as the cloud at the ascension. It is significant that at the end of the scene the disciples saw no man save Jesus only. Moses and Elijah, the law and the promise, types and shadows, pass away; the gospel, the fulfilment, the substance, Christ remains—the only one who can relieve the misery of earth and glorify our nature, Christ all in all.
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Rice, Edwin Wilbur, DD. Entry for 'Transfiguration'. People's Dictionary of the Bible. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/rpd/t/transfiguration.html. 1893.
