Note: Transfiguration in these passages the term 'glory' occurs 21 times.
Flowers for the Feast form a 'threefiguration' of bouquets.
Breviary
Office of Readings
FIRST READING
From the second letter of the apostle Paul to the Corinthians
3:7-4:6
Christ is the splendor of the new covenant
If the ministry of death, carved in writing on stone, was inaugurated with such glory that the Israelites could not look on Moses’ face because of the glory that shone on it (even though it was a fading glory), how much greater will be the glory of the ministry of the Spirit? If the ministry of the covenant that condemned had glory, greater by far is the glory of the ministry that justifies. Indeed, when you compare that limited glory with this surpassing glory, the former should be declared no glory at all. If what was destined to pass away was given in glory, greater by far is the glory that endures.
Our hope being such, we act with full confidence. We are not like Moses, who used to hide his face with a veil so that the Israelites could not see the final fading of that glory. Their minds, of course, were dulled. To this very day, when the old covenant is read the veil remains unlifted; it is only in Christ that it is taken away. Even now, when Moses is read a veil covers their understanding. “But whenever he turns to the Lord, the veil will be removed.” Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. All of us, gazing on the Lord’s glory with unveiled faces, are being transformed from glory to glory into his very image by the Lord who is the Spirit.
Because we possess this ministry through God’s mercy, we do not give into discouragement. Rather, we repudiate shameful, underhanded practices. We do not resort to trickery or falsify the word of God. We proclaim the truth openly and commend ourselves to every man’s conscience before God. If our gospel can be called “veiled” in any sense, it is such only for those who are headed toward destruction. Their unbelieving minds have been blinded by the god of this present age so that they do not see the splendor of the gospel showing forth the glory of Christ, the image of God.
It is not ourselves we preach but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts, that we in turn might make known the glory of God shining on the face of Christ.
SECOND READING
From a sermon on the transfiguration of the Lord by Saint Anastasius of Sinai, bishop
(Nn. 6-10: Melanges d’archéologie et d’histoire 67 [1955], 241-244)
It is good for us to be here
Upon Mount Tabor, Jesus revealed to his disciples a heavenly mystery. While living among them he had spoken of the kingdom and of his second coming in glory, but to banish from their hearts any possible doubt concerning the kingdom and to confirm their faith in what lay in the future by its prefiguration in the present, he gave them on Mount Tabor a wonderful vision of his glory, a foreshadowing of the kingdom of heaven. It was as if he said to them: “As time goes by you may be in danger of losing your faith. To save you from this I tell you now that some standing here listening to me will not taste death until they have seen the Son of Man coming in the glory of his Father.” Moreover, in order to assure us that Christ could command such power when he wished, the evangelist continues: Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter, James and John, and led them up a high mountain where they were alone. There, before their eyes, he was transfigured. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as light. Then the disciples saw Moses and Elijah appear, and they were talking to Jesus.
These are the divine wonders we celebrate today; this is the saving revelation given us upon the mountain; this is the festival of Christ that has drawn us here. Let us listen, then, to the sacred voice of God so compellingly calling us from on high, from the summit of the mountain, so that with the Lord’s chosen disciples we may penetrate the deep meaning of these holy mysteries, so far beyond our capacity to express. Jesus goes before us to show us the way, both up the mountain and into heaven, and—I speak boldly—it is for us now to follow him with all speed, yearning for the heavenly vision that will give us a share in his radiance, renew our spiritual nature and transform us into his own likeness, making us for ever sharers in his Godhead and raising us to heights as yet undreamed of.
Let us run with confidence and joy to enter into the cloud like Moses and Elijah, or like James and John. Let us be caught up like Peter to behold the divine vision and to be transfigured by that glorious transfiguration. Let us retire from the world, stand aloof from the earth, rise above the body, detach ourselves from creatures and turn to the creator, to whom Peter in ecstasy exclaimed: Lord, it is good for us to be here.
It is indeed good to be here, as you have said, Peter. It is good to be with Jesus and to remain here for ever. What greater happiness or higher honor could we have than to be with God, to be made like him and to live in his light?
Therefore, since each of us possesses God in his heart and is being transformed into his divine image, we also should cry out with joy: It is good for us to be here—here where all things shine with divine radiance, where there is joy and gladness and exultation; where there is nothing in our hearts but peace, serenity and stillness; where God is seen. For here, in our hearts, Christ takes up his abode together with the Father, saying as he enters: Today salvation has come to this house. With Christ, our hearts receive all the wealth of his eternal blessings, and there where they are stored up for us in him, we see reflected as in a mirror both the first fruits and the whole of the world to come.
RESPONSORY
Matthew 17:2, 3; see Luke 9:32, 34
His face shone like the sun;
– when the disciples saw his glory,
they were filled with wonder and fear.
Suddenly Moses and Elijah appeared before them
speaking with Jesus.
– When the disciples saw his glory,
they were filled with wonder and fear.
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John Chrysostom: The Mystery of the Transfiguration and the Significance of Moses and ElijahTuesday, Aug 6 2013
Jesus said to his disciples: If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for my sake, shall find it (Matthew 16:24-25).
Jesus sets before Peter, James and John…these persons – Moses and Elijah.
Each of these, having lost his life, found it. For each of them both spake boldly unto tyrants, Moses to the Egyptian, Elijah to Ahab; and in behalf of heartless and disobedient men; and by the very persons who were saved by them, they were brought into extreme danger; and each of them wishing to withdraw men from idolatry.
[...] What if Moses clave a sea? Peter walked on the water, and was able to remove mountains, and used to work cures of all manner of bodily diseases, and to drive away savage demons, and by the shadow of his body to work those wonderful and great prodigies; and changed the whole world. And if Elijah too raised a dead man, yet these apostles raised ten thousand….
He brings them forward accordingly for this cause also. For He would have them emulate their winning ways toward the people, and their presence of mind and inflexibility; and that they should be meek like Moses, and jealous for God like Elijah, and full of tender care, as they were. For Elijah endured a famine of three years for the Jewish people; and Moses said, “If thou wilt forgive them their sin, forgive; else blot me too out of the book, which thou hast written.”
Now of all this He was reminding Peter, James and John by the vision. For He brought those in glory too, not that these should stay where they were, but that they might even surpass their limitary lines. [...] For “except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of Heaven.”
For not into Egypt did they enter, but into the whole world, worse disposed than the Egyptians; neither were they to speak with Pharaoh, but to fight hand to hand with the devil, the very prince of wickedness. Yea, and their appointed struggle was, both to bind him, and to spoil all his goods; and this they did cleaving not the sea, but an abyss of ungodliness, through the rod of Jesse,—an abyss having waves far more grievous.
See at any rate how many things there were to put the men in fear; death, poverty, dishonor, their innumerable sufferings…. But nevertheless against all these things He persuaded them boldly to venture, and to pass as along dry ground with all security. To train them therefore for all this, He brought forward those who shone forth under the old law.
John Chrysostom (c.347-407): Homilies on the Gospel According to St Matthew, 56.
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