But there was yet another lesson which the apostles learnt from the
transfiguration of our Lord. They beheld Moses and Elijah talking with
Him:—Moses the great lawgiver of their nation, Elijah the chief of all
the Jewish prophets. We must consider this a little to find out the
whole depth of its meaning. You remember how Christ had spoken of
Himself as having come, not to destroy the Law and the Prophets, but to
fulfil them. You remember, too, how He had always said that He was the
person of whom the Law and the Prophets had spoken.
Here was an actual sign and witness that His words were true—here was
Moses, the giver of the Law, and Elijah, the chief of the Prophets,
talking with Him, bearing witness to Him in their own persons, and
shewing, too, that it was His death and His perfect sacrifice that they
had been shadowing forth in the sacrifices of the law and in the dark
speeches of prophecy. For they talked with Him of His death, which He
was to accomplish at Jerusalem. What more perfect testimony could the
apostles have had to shew them that Jesus of Nazareth, their Master, was
He of whom the Law and the Prophets spoke—that He was indeed the Christ
for whom Moses and Elijah, and all the saints of old, had looked; and
that He was come not to destroy the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfil
them? We can hardly understand the awe and the delight with which the
disciples must have beheld those blessed Three—Moses, and Elias, and
Jesus Christ, their Lord, talking together before their very eyes. For
of all men in the world, Moses and Elias were to them the greatest. All
true-hearted Israelites, who knew the history of their nation, and
understood the promises of God, must have felt that Moses and Elias were
the two greatest heroes and saviours of their nation, whom God had ever
yet raised up. And the joy and the honour of thus seeing them face to
face, the very men whom they had loved and reverenced in their thoughts,
whom they had heard and read of from their childhood, as the greatest
ornaments and glories of their nation—the joy and the honour, I say, of
that unexpected sight, added to the wonderful majesty which was suddenly
revealed to their transfigured Lord, seemed to have been too much for
them—they knew not what to say. Such company seemed to them for the
moment heaven enough; and St. Peter first finding words exclaimed, “Lord,
it is good for us to be here. If thou wilt let us build three
tabernacles, one for Thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias.” Not, I
fancy, that they intended to worship Moses and Elias, but that they felt
that Moses and Elias, as well as Christ, had each a divine message, which
must be listened to; and therefore, they wished that each of them might
have his own tabernacle, and dwell among men, and each teach his own
particular doctrine and wisdom in his own school. It may seem strange
that they should put Moses and Elias so on an equality with Christ, but
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