Tf " And while he was praying, the appearance of his face underwent a change," says Luke ; he alone preserving for us this vital fact of "prayer," of profound and deliberate absorption in the Divine Life, as the immediate cause of the transfigured bodily state. This change, this radiance, seemed to the astonished on- lookers to spread to the whole personality ; conferring upon it an enhancement and a splendour which the limited brains of those who saw could only translate into terms of light — " His clothing became white, and like the flashing lightning" — whiter, says Mark, with a touch of convincing realism, than any fuller can bleach it. Bound together by a community of expectation and personal devotion, and now in that state upon the verge of sleep in which the mind is peculiarly open to suggestion, it is not marvellous that this, to them conclusive and almost terrible, testimony of Messiahship should produce strange effects upon those who were looking on. In an atmosphere so highly charged with wonder and enthusiasm, the human brain is at a hopeless dis- advantage. Such concepts as it is able to manufacture from the amazing material poured in on it will take of necessity a symbolic form. In minds dominated by the influence of a personality of unique spiritual greatness, and full of images of those Old Testa- ment prophecies which seemed to be in course of actual fulfilment before their eyes, all the conditions were present for the produc-
344 THE TRANSFIGURATION
tion of a collective vision in which such images played a promi- nent part; bodying forth the ideas evoked in them by the spectacle of their Master's ecstasy. That Master, whose deep humanity had never failed them yet, whose strangest powers had always been evoked in response to the necessities of men, was now seen removed from them by a vast distance. Unconscious of their very existence, His whole being appeared to be absorbed in communion with another order, by them unseen.1
Tf There is a height in prayer above communion. What shall I call it ? It may be named the prayer of surrender. Very few ever utter that prayer to its utmost syllable. Few ever really lay themselves, spirit and soul and body, on God's altar. We are always withholding something, keeping back from God some dear and cherished possession, some gift or talent or power, some love or pleasure or passion. We will not yield up some one dear and tightly held joy. Yet when we do pray this prayer we pass on to an experience which seals us with a seal that cannot be broken, to the service of God for ever. Then on the transparent mirror of the face the light leaps and flashes, and some of it abides. That is the secret of that heavenly and almost intolerable radiance on the face of Moses which men feared to look upon. He had come out of that most holy place and offered up his prayer of surrender in these solemn words, "But if not, blot out my name from thy book." That is why Stephen's face shone in the council. His clear and discerning mind saw his martyr death before him, and he yielded himself up to God's will. Could we have seen Paul's face when he heard God's words, " My grace is sufficient for thee," and meekly accepted God's will, we would have seen the sheen of the transfiguring light also upon it. He did not know whether he was " in the body " or " out of it." That is why Christ's face shone as He prayed. And that is how our faces also shall be transfigured.2
5. With what overwhelming awe must these men have looked
upon their Master ! They had become familiar with Him as with
a man sharing their nature, His face lined with the furrows of
care, His visage sorrowfully marred, beautiful, yea, passing
beautiful, and yet always overshadowed with the signs of sorrow.
As they looked up from their bewildered sleep in the darkness of
the night, they beheld Him white as the light, His raiment
glistening as with the radiance of the snow-capped peaks behind
1 Evelyn Underhill, The Mystic Way, 118. W. M. Clow, The Secret of the Lord, 182-
ST. MATTHEW xvn. i, 2 345
Him, His whole Person standing out in clear relief against the dark background, the lightning flashing upon the bosom of the night. Long years after, Peter, writing of the vision, said, " We were eyewitnesses of his majesty." The word there translated " majesty " occurs only three times in Scripture. Once it is trans- lated " mighty power," once " magnificence," and once " majesty." The thought it suggests is that of splendour, of overwhelming beauty and glory, and that which arrests and subdues the mind to the point of adoration and worship ; and Peter, looking back to the splendours of that night scene, wrote, " We were eyewitnesses of his majesty."
^[ The Transfiguration is the key-word of the Incarnation. Jesus Christ went up into a mountain to reveal to the chosen three the secret of the Kingdom. Before they ever tasted death they were to see the Kingdom come on earth. A moment was to sweep over them when the hidden workings were to be laid bare to them of that action which should hereafter perpetuate the tabernacling of God among men. Alas ! their eyes were heavy at the time, and their wits were clouded, and they were dazed by the excess of glory ! They wist not what they saw or said. But yet one swift glance they won before tke cloud enveloped them, and in that glance they caught sight of Jesus transfigured. Trans- figured ! It was the Jesus whom they knew, the same, and not another. Everything that constituted His identity in face and form was there, unobliterated — only, it was raised to a new power, it was possessed by unanticipated capacities. A Higher Force had smitten into it, had released itself through it, so that it shone and glowed. It was uplifted, changed, yet the same, burning, yet never, consumed. The body showed itself, not as unnaturalized, but as the true and proper organ of the forces which should reveal themselves through it. It was made clear that its natural con- struction adapted it to become the vehicle of the invading Spirit : it finds its own life in becoming transfigured.1