The Transfiguration

Six days after Peter had called him the Christ, Mark and Matthew say, Jesus took Peter, James Son of Zebedee and John the Apostle up a high mountain by themselves (Mark 8:29; 9:2; Matthew 17:1). Luke says “about eight days”, and that he went up to pray (Luke 9:28).

There, the three Gospels report, his appearance changed in front of them. Mark says that his clothing became “glistening, exceedingly white” (Mark 9:2–3). Matthew adds that his face shone like the sun (Matthew 17:2). Moses and Elijah appeared and talked with him (Mark 9:4). Only Luke gives the subject: they spoke of his “departure”, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem (Luke 9:30–31). Peter proposed to make three tents, one each for Jesus, Moses and Elijah; Mark remarks that he did not know what to say, because they were very afraid (Mark 9:5–6).

A cloud then overshadowed them, and a voice came out of it: “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him” (Mark 9:7). In Matthew the disciples fell on their faces, and Jesus touched them and told them not to be afraid (Matthew 17:6–7). When they looked around they saw only Jesus (Mark 9:8). On the way down he ordered them to tell no one what they had seen until the Son of Man had risen from the dead (Mark 9:9). They asked why the scribes said that Elijah must come first. He answered that Elijah had already come and had been treated as people pleased (Mark 9:11–13); Matthew notes that the disciples understood him to mean John the Baptist (Matthew 17:13).

The Gospels do not name the mountain. Cyril of Jerusalem, teaching about three hundred years later, speaks of the transfiguration “on Mount Tabor” (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures 12.16), and Mount Tabor in Galilee is the traditional site.

In all three Gospels the scene stands between Jesus’s first announcement that he must suffer and be killed (Mark 8:31) and his journey to Jerusalem. The voice echoes the one at his baptism (Mark 1:11), and the two figures beside him are the lawgiver and the prophet whose return Malachi had promised (Malachi 4:4–5). The second letter of Peter appeals to the event as something its author saw and heard: “we were eyewitnesses of his majesty”, and “we heard this voice come out of heaven when we were with him on the holy mountain” (2 Peter 1:16–18).