Daily Retreat 08/06/06

2006 Aug 6 SUN: TRANSFIGURATION OF THE LORD F

Dn 7: 9-10. 13-14/ Ps 96(97): 1-2. 5-6. 9/ 2 Pt 1: 16-19/ Mk 9: 2-10

From today’s readings:  “As the visions during the night continued, I saw One like a Son of man coming, on the clouds of Heaven....  The Lord is king, the Most High over all the earth....  We ourselves heard this voice come from Heaven while we were with Him on the holy mountain....   Jesus took Peter, James, and his brother John, and led them up a high mountain apart by themselves. And He was transfigured before them, and His clothes became dazzling white....”

Triptych of the Transfiguration

The word “triptych” denotes a set of three related paintings, with the central, most important subject flanked by two other depictions, important in their own right, but used in the triptych setting to further accentuate the main work.

The Transfiguration of Jesus is, it seems, a divine triptych, with Jesus, God’s beloved Son flanked by Moses and Elijah, those two towering figures from the Old Testament who together represent the fullness of the Law and the Prophets, and the very purpose of those planks of Divine Revelation, namely, to set the stage for the coming of the Son of Man and the fullness of His eternal light.

But we modern Christians sometimes forget, or worse still, have never learned the importance of Moses.  I recall coming across a riddle in my youth, “How many of each type of animal did Moses bring aboard the ark with him?”   It’s a trick question, of course, because it was Noah, not Moses, who built the ark!  And yet when I tried this riddle out on some contemporaries, and they fell for it and answered “Two,” I tried re-asking the question, dropping a hint with heavy emphasis on the anachronistic name: “How many did MOSES bring aboard the ark?” but they still didn’t get it.  Finally, I had to explain the riddle to them, but rather than feeling sheepish about their mistake, they just would shrug their shoulders and admit, “Well, I don’t know that much about the Bible anyway.”  And evidently, just didn’t care to learn any more....

For Christians, the most important books of the Bible are the Gospels, the first four books of the New Testament.  For Jews, the most important part of the Bible is the Torah, also known as the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Testament, sometimes referred to as the “Books of Moses.” Hearing that title, some people naturally assumed that meant that Moses had written Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.  But that theory makes it rather difficult to explain the verses in Deuteronomy that depict the death of Moses!  In reality, the Torah scrolls were called the “books of Moses” simply because Moses is the central character in all those books, except Genesis, of course, which, however, clearly leads up to the birth of Moses at the beginning of Exodus.

It was Moses whom God chose to lead the children of Israel out of the slavery of Egypt, and the first quarter of Exodus recounts how difficult a task that was!  Then, at the center of the Book of Exodus, Chapter 20, God gives the 10 Commandments, through His servant Moses, the mediator of the divine covenant.  The rest of the Pentateuch chronicles the unflagging leadership of Moses during adventures and misadventures of God’s people wandering through the wilderness for 40 years, and the compilation of the Mosaic Law which governed the Israelites. 

Fittingly, the final verses of the Pentateuch conclude, “No one has arisen in Israel like Moses, whom the LORD knew face-to-face.  He had no equal in all the signs and wonders the LORD sent him to perform in the land of Egypt against Pharaoh and all his servants and against all his land, and for the might and the terrifying power that Moses exhibited in the sight of all Israel.”  A pretty impressive man indeed, that Moses, the unrivaled champion of Law and Order, and Freedom, and yet, he’s one of the supporting actors in the drama of the Transfiguration!

Along with Elijah!  Now, God sent Elijah to His people centuries after Moses, and even several generations after David and Solomon.  At that time, the majority of the Israelites, including the monarchy, had abandoned their God, the Ancient One, in favor of various new age pagan idols who seemed more in touch with where the people were at.  You see, not only did the pagan religions neatly dispense with the burdensome ethical impositions of the Decalogue, but there was even room in the heathen rites for sexual orgies, and human sacrifice of innocent children, and other such barbarisms which should be unimaginable in our more civilized age.

And without warning, in the midst of this sad state of affairs, God sends Elijah as His prophet, and though outnumbered 450 to one, he confidently challenges the pagan prophets to a contest on Mt. Carmel, and on that holy mountain, the Ancient One flashes forth flames of fire, with wheels of burning fire. A surging stream of fire flowed out from where the One True God confirmed Elijah’s prophetic message as altogether reliable, as a lamp shining in a dark place.  Even when later taken up to Heaven in a whirlwind, Elijah, the prince and prototype of all the prophets, remained in the hearts and consciences of the chosen people as the great man of God, the holy hero who would come again before the Day of the Lord, that great and terrible day!   

In the Book of Ecclesiasticus, Sacred Scripture records these words of his praise:
   How awesome are you, ELIJAH! Whose glory is equal to yours?
   You brought a dead man back to life from the nether world, by the will of the LORD.
   You sent kings down to destruction, and nobles, from their beds of sickness.
   You heard threats at Sinai, at Horeb avenging judgments.
   You anointed kings who should inflict vengeance, and a prophet as your successor.
   You were taken aloft in a whirlwind, in a chariot with fiery horses.
   You are destined, it is written, in time to come to put an end to wrath before the day of the LORD,
    To turn back the hearts of fathers toward their sons, and to reestablish the tribes of Jacob.
   Blessed is he who shall have seen you before he dies!

And yet Elijah, for all his fiery aplomb and matchless retinue of miracles, nonetheless willingly cedes center stage to the dazzling white Son of Man.

Who is it then, who stands in the center of this divine triptych, flanked by Moses representing the rightful might of the Law, and Elijah, personifying the peerless power of holy prophecy?  At the very center is Jesus, the beloved Son of God, whom the Apostles had indeed acknowledged as the Messiah and Holy One of God, yet without realizing the full extent of His glory and dominion, without understanding that Moses and Elijah, and all that was good and true and holy and beautiful gives testimony, as did God Himself, that we should listen to Him!

Like Peter, James, and John, you and I have doubtlessly underestimated Jesus in various ways, for even when we sincerely confess Him as our Lord and Savior, how often do our sinful actions crowd Him to the peripherals of the drama of our own life, how often does our bloated pride upstage His rightful place in our hearts, how often we fail to focus on Him, and listen to Him!

Let this then be the day for the Son of Man to be transfigured anew in our lives, so that the eternal triptych may shine with the light of Christ, flanked not just by Moses and Elijah, but with all faithful saints of old along with zealous disciples of today, who together agree, “Lord, how good it is for us to be here with You in the center of our lives!”