It seems worth while, even at such length, to describe the scenery along this journey, and the look and situation of Cæsarea, when we recall the importance of the events enacted there, or in the immediate neighbourhood. It was into this chiefly Gentile district, that the Lord now withdrew with His disciples after that last and decisive question of the Pharisees. It was here that, as His question, like Moses' rod, struck their hearts, there leaped from the lips of Peter the living, life-spreading waters of his confession. It may have been, that this rock-wall below the castle, from under which sprang Jordan, or the rock on which the castle stood, supplied the material suggestion for Christ's words: Thou art Peter, and on this rock will I build My Church.' [3630] In Cæsarea, or its immediate neighbourhood, [3631] did the Lord spend, with His disciples, six days after this confession; and here, close by, on one of the heights of snowy Hermon, was the scene of the Transfiguration, the light of which shone for ever into the hearts of the disciples on their dark and tangled path; [3632] nay, far beyond that - beyond life and death - beyond the grave and the judgment, to the perfect brightness of the Resurrection-day.
As we think of it, there seems nothing strange in it, but all most wise and most gracious, that such events should have taken place far away from Galilee and Israel, in the lonely grandeur of the shadows of Hermon, and even amongst a chiefly Gentile population. Not in Judæa, nor even in Galilee - but far away from the Temple, the Synagogue, the Priests, Pharisees and Scribes, was the first confession of the Church made, and on this confession its first foundations laid. Even this spoke of near judgment and doom to what had once been God's chosen congregation. And all that happened, though Divinely shaped as regards the end, followed in a natural and orderly succession of events. Let us briefly recall the circumstances, which in the previous chapters have been described in detail.
It had been needful to leave Capernaum. The Galilean Ministry of the Christ was ended, and, alike the active persecutions of the Pharisees from Jerusalem, the inquiries of Herod, whose hands, stained with the blood of the Baptist, were tremblingly searching for his greater Successor, and the growing indecision and unfitness of the people - as well as the state of the disciples - pointed to the need for leaving Galilee. Then followed the Last Supper' to Israel on the eastern shore of Lake Gennesaret, when they would have made Him a King. He must now withdraw quite away, out of the boundaries of Israel. Then came that miraculous night-journey, the brief Sabbath-stay at Capernaum by the way, the journey through Tyrian and Sidonian territory, and round to the Decapolis, the teaching and healing there, the gathering of the multitude to Him, together with that Supper,' which closed His Ministry there, and, finally, the withdrawal to Tarichæa, where His Apostles, as fishermen of the Lake, may have had business-connections, since the place was the great central depot for selling and preparing the fish for export.
In that distant and obscure corner, on the boundary-line between Jew and Gentile, had that greatest crisis in the history of the world occurred, which sealed the doom of Israel, and in their place substituted the Gentiles as citizens of the Kingdom. And, in this respect also, it is most significant, that the confession of the Church likewise took place in territory chiefly inhabited by Gentiles, and the Transfiguration on Mount Hermon. That crisis had been the public challenge of the Pharisees and Sadducees, that Jesus should legitimate His claims to the Messiahship by a sign from heaven. It is not too much to assert, that neither His questioners, nor even His disciples, understood the answer of Jesus, nor yet perceived the meaning of His sign.' To the Pharisees Jesus would seem to have been defeated, and to stand self-convicted of having made Divine claims which, when challenged, He could not substantiate. He had hitherto elected(as they, who understood not His teaching, would judge) to prove Himself the Messiah by the miracles which He had wrought - and now, when met on His own ground, He had publicly declined, or at least evaded, the challenge. He had conspicuously - almost self-confessedly - failed! At least, so it would appear to those who could not understand His reply and sigh.' We note that a similar final challenge was addressed to Jesus by the High-Priest, when he adjured Him to say, whether He was what He claimed. His answer then was an assertion - not a proof; and, unsupported as it seemed, His questioners would only regard it as blasphemy.