FINDINGS III By Harry T. Cook

Last Epiphany 2012   

Mark 9: 2-9            

Harry T. Cook

The Revised Common Lectionary appoints in each of the three years, A,B and C for the Sunday Sunday Next Before Lent one or another of the synoptic versions of what is called the "transfiguration" of Jesus. The Greek in the text of Mark and Matthew is μετεμορφώθη ("was transfigured") while Luke merely says "the appearance of his face was altered." Mark and Matthew say this event occurred "six days later." Six days after passion prediction of Mark 8:31ff? C.S. Mann suggests it may refer to the days intervening since the last Sabbath. Maybe the time factor here is irrelevant.

There is a good chance that this story is a retrojection, i.e. something that may have been part of the disciples' experience following the death of Jesus, but placed in the common narrative as having occurred earlier. The "high mountain" of Mark and Matthew and the "mountain" of Luke certainly suggest some kind of extraordinary appearance. Think of Moses on Sinai and Elijah on his mountainside.

Speaking of Moses and Elijah, the depiction of Jesus' converse with the two figures of Jewish legend suggests that either Jesus is dead as they are, or that Moses and Elijah were alive, albeit in some kind of resurrected form. It seemed important to Mark, who may have been the first to tell the story, that the three were talking together, that they were more than wraiths moving in the ether, but purposely and purposefully in conversation, about what we are never told.

The proximity of Jesus to Moses and Elijah is an exchange of status. For Jews of the late first century C.E., placing Jesus in company with the great lawgiver and the prototypical prophet elevates him to a level of significance any observant Jew of the time would appreciate. To Gentile converts to Jesus Judaism on its way to becoming Christianity, placing Moses and Elijah on a mountain with Jesus ties the older traditions to the new -- a kind of cross legitimization.

Three disciples are named as having accompanied Jesus up the mountain: Peter, James and John -- though Luke has the order as Peter, John and James. I take the selection of the three in whatever order to signify that they ranked high in the lore of late first century Judaism as early leaders of the movement. In any event, they were included in the mountain trek apart, as if in retreat not only from the world but from the other closer followers as well. Luke says, characteristically, that the purpose of the retreat was "to pray."

Once on the mountain it is said that the appearance of Jesus' face was altered and that his clothing became dazzling white. Think here of sunlight reflecting off a mountain snow, and of the blinding light of shekinah, e.g. the glory of Yahweh upon which the ancient Hebrew believed he dared not look for fear of instant death. See Exodus 34:30 and the fear with which Aaron and the Israelites were said to have greeted the altered face of Moses. All that is represented in these texts.

Mark says Peter, James and John were "terrified." I love the Greek here: έκφοβοι, lit. "feared out." Our generation would say "freaked out," and it would be very close to the sense of έκφοβοι. As if the altered countenance and clothes-on-fire were not enough to freak them out, then comes the cloud and a voice out of it saying that Jesus is the beloved Son. The figure of the cloud can be taken to mean that the event itself was meant to be taken as a kind of mystical or numinous experience as the unseen and un-seeable deity moves in to speak the divine word of approbation.

V.9 of the passage brings us back down the mountain but suggests that what has been reported as having taken place there was a thing of the imagination. Mark depicts Jesus charging them to tell no one of what they had seen, though no mention of what they had heard. Odd, because Mark seems to include them in the hearing of the voice and its pronouncement of Jesus' divine son-hood -- the very thing the Jesus movement will go on to preach. Nevertheless, it must be the "word" that is to convict the innermost self apart from outward and visible signs.

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An interesting homiletic or teaching point might be to ask if Peter, James and John were also transfigured in some way by what is said to have happened on the mountain. Did the original teller of the story imagine that they were changed by what they experienced? It seems clear that the story was crafted as a proposition, the proposition being that Jesus was in the same league with Moses and Elijah, yet a cut above because of that voice from the cloud. What can such a proposition mean in 2012? And how to preach and teach it?

The story seems to make a distinction between what is seen and what is heard, suggesting that the religious expression out of which the story comes is oriented to the auditory rather than to the visual. That's the difference between radio and television. I can well remember the radio serials of my childhood: "Suspense," "True Detective Mysteries" and "The Shadow." They came with arresting sound effects and drew in the listener who took in every word. You had to because it was the word that carried the story. When television came into my life in my early teens, and then not so much as the reception was sketchy and that only from two channels, I thought then and think now that something important was lost. Radio had made my mind an active participant in the story, even as I lay on the floor next the big Philco. Television made me a spectator.

Perhaps part of the reason certain churches seem to have lost their way is that not enough attention is paid to the spoken word. Homilists in many places now slouch around the church with portable microphones, aping the late-night monologists with their one-liners and lame jokes. The latter may make congregations titter now and then, but the fare is slim and the soup is thin.

It is all well and good that the laity has been ceded the work of reading aloud the lections during the service. But so often the majesty of the texts is lost in poor delivery born, I think, of poor preparation and poor talent.

Who asks what anyone "saw" at church? People are asked what they "heard" in church. The liturgy is more or less predictable as to the visual. What is not predictable is what one is liable to "hear" in the readings from the bible or other literary sources and what one "hears" from the homilist of the day about those readings.

This is a brief for a rigorous course and a thorough examination for those who will be chosen to read biblical texts during the liturgy - with those who may want to do it but are not cut out for the task kindly but firmly rejected. It is, moreover, a brief for new and improved homiletic courses in graduate schools of theology and seminaries - courses that stress careful exegesis based on a thorough knowledge of scriptural texts with the end result being exquisitely crafted homilies and sermons. To that end, I commend the Samuel Clemens/Mark Twain insight to the effect that the difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.