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Bible Dictionaries
Transfigure
Vine's Expository Dictionary of NT Words
or "to change into another form" (meta, implying change, and morphe, "form:" see FORM , No. 1), is used in the Passive Voice (a) of Christ's "transfiguration," Matthew 17:2; Mark 9:2; Luke (in Luke 9:29 ) avoids this term, which might have suggested to gentile readers the metamorphoses of heathen gods, and uses the phrase egeneto heteron, "was altered," lit., "became (ginomai) different (heteros);" (b) of believers, Romans 12:2 , "be ye transformed," the obligation being to undergo a complete change which, under the power of God, will find expression in character and conduct; morphe lays stress on the inward change, schema (see the preceding verb in that verse, suschematizo) lays stress on the outward (see FASHION , No. 3, FORM, No. 2); the present continuous tenses indicate a process; 2 Corinthians 3:18 describes believers as being "transformed (RV) into the same image" (i.e., of Christ in all His moral excellencies), the change being effected by the Holy Spirit.
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Vines, W. E., M. A. Entry for 'Transfigure'. Vine's Expository Dictionary of NT Words. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/ved/t/transfigure.html. 1940.
