St Augustine’s Interpretation of the Transfiguration of Christ

Abstract In contemplating the Transfiguration of Christ, Augustine inherited a tradition of interpretation in the Greek Fathers, going back to Irenaeus and dominated by Origen, though there had already emerged a distinct twist in Latin interpretation (by Ambrose and Jerome) which understood the Transfiguration in the light of the verse that precedes it, about those who will not see death before the coming of the Kingdom (Matt 16:20 and parallels), who are identified with the disciples who witnessed the Transfiguration, lending it an eschatological dimension. Within this perspective, Augustine’s interpretation is strikingly personal: Christocentric, ecclesial, alluding to the deeper mysteries of the Trinity and the lncarnation, which belong to the realm of the heart, not to the world of external reality, and undergirding all this, a powerful sense of the apostolic charge to fulfil the Dominical command of love.