Second Sunday of Lent: Transfiguration and Tents

Readings: Matthew 17:1-19.

What on earth is St. Peter thinking? In the middle of this mystical scene, a moment of profound and unique encounter with God, Peter seems to be concerning himself with practicalities, interrupting the Lord’s discourse with Moses and Elijah to talk about camping. It’s tempting to suppose that this is yet another example of the apostolic ineptitude that we see throughout the gospels, of St. Peter getting so close to the truth but then dramatically missing the point. Anyway, isn’t that what we’d expect from Peter, the one who confessed Jesus and then denied him, who tried to defend Jesus with the sword, whose first words to Jesus in St. Luke’s gospel were “leave me alone” (Lk 5.8)?

There’s certainly something in that reading, but on this occasion I wonder whether we might be a little hasty in dismissing St. Peter’s desire to get busy camping. However bizarre we might find Peter’s talk about tents, it nonetheless seems to pre-empt God’s own action: just as Peter suggests they build three tents, God himself builds a single tent over all present, covering them in the shekinah cloud. Whereas Peter’s suggestion keeps apart the messianic figure of Christ, Moses (representing the law) and Elijah (representing the prophetic tradition), God’s action houses them together: Christ personally reflects the fulfilment of the three-fold tradition of priesthood, prophecy and kingship, because he is—as the voice in the cloud says—“God’s beloved Son”. The transfiguration of Christ is a moment of revelation and manifestation, in which the three disciples’ knowledge of who Jesus is for them is deepened: just as Moses’ face glowed in reflection of God’s glory after he spoke with the Lord, Christ’s face glows of its own accord and his garments reflect his own glow, because he is the Lord, truly God in human history. 

In the Greek, St. Peter’s remarks about tents don’t so much emerge as offering an interjection as providing an answer (apokrinomai). This remarkable scene has challenged Peter, interrogating his presuppositions. Indeed, the gospel writer explicitly locates the event on the mountain as occurring six days after Peter’s confession of Christ’s messianic identity at Caesarea Phillipi, days in which Jesus has filled Peter’s nascent messianic faith with content, first revealing that his messiahship—despite what Peter may have initially thought—will involve suffering, and now making manifest a foretaste of the glory of the resurrection. In St. Matthew’s account of the incident, we are left wondering what Our Lord discussed with Elijah and Moses. St Luke, however, fills in some of the details, reporting that they were discussing Christ’s exodus (his “departure” from this world, Luke 9:31). Against this backdrop, building a tent makes much more sense as a symbolic gesture: the Jewish festival of booths (sukkoth) recalled those Exodus years of wandering in the wilderness with God, dwelling in tents alongisde the Lord who dwelt in his own tent (the tabernacle). 

Peter’s vocation as the first Pope will, of course, involve building a shelter where man can rest with God. But as at Tabor, so today, it is God’s activity that predominates. The cloud descends, preventing Peter from focusing on the distant scene, forcing him to see what is before his eyes. Our Lenten penance should also help us to see what is before our eyes more clearly, but the cloud that descends on the mountain is like no natural cloud that merely conceals and hides, but constitutes a place of light that, in concealing, also reveals the glory of God. It is part of the Christian mystery that in those moments in which God reveals himself most fully he seems most un-Godly: in the incarnation, God’s full revelation in human history, God conceals himself in revealing himself as a helpless baby. The Church too is a place of transfiguration, elevating creation to God in Christ, and thus making it radiant with the Glory of God. We don’t wander round sparkling with the dazzling radiance of the Lord’s glory, of course, but the Church remains the place where God reveals himself in the institution that can easily seem to be a concealment.

But, leaving theology aside, there’s a human level on which I hope I would have responded as Peter did. His words—“Lord, it is good for us to be here”—reveal a heart fully alive, a moment in which Peter experiences the fullness of life and love in God. Why wouldn’t we want to hold on to such a moment of encounter with God, to prolong this joy, to stay in God’s presence a while longer, even if it meant building a tent? Yet Christ’s words to Peter suggest that we ought to be wary of such selfishness with regard to the desire for mystical experience: we might be lucky and find that we are singled out for a moment of closeness to God, but then we too will have to head down the mountain. The three disciples are singled out as the inner core of Christ’s followers, those who will become the leading Apostles and have to squarely face up to the difficult task of spreading the gospel to the whole world. They receive this transfiguration as gift, a pledge to secure their hope, but they are sworn to secrecy only until their moment comes. The joy that they receive is a joy to be passed on, to be shared: they taste the promised resurrection before the cross, but the cross will certainly come.