<p>17:9&nbsp;<em>And as they came down from the mountain, Jesus commanded them, saying: Tell the vision to no one, until the Son of Man be risen from the dead</em>- Whilst this literally means &lsquo;the thing seen&rsquo;, the transfiguration was indeed a vision. Seeing that Christ is the firstfruits from the dead and that there is no conscious survival of death, it follows that at best Moses and Elijah were resurrected especially for the occasion. But they &ldquo;appeared in glory&rdquo; (Lk. 9:31), as if they were in the Kingdom. The Greek translated &ldquo;appeared&rdquo; has the strong sense of &lsquo;being seen / observed&rsquo;. This is how they were seen- another hint at a vision. When the event finished, Lk. 9:36 says that Jesus was &ldquo;found alone&rdquo;- but that is a poor translation of&nbsp;<em>heurisko</em>. He was seen, perceived alone- again hinting that the entire experience was a vision rather than occurring in reality. The way that &ldquo;Suddenly, when they had looked round about&rdquo; they saw only Jesus, finding Moses and Elijah had disappeared (Mk. 9:8) would also hint at a visionary experience. Note that there is no suggestion that Moses and Elijah went off anywhere, let alone &lsquo;returned&rsquo; to Heaven. The vision of them simply abruptly ended. They saw nobody &ldquo;except Jesus only with themselves&rdquo; or &ldquo;they no longer saw anyone with them except Jesus&rdquo; (Mk. 9:8) would suggest that they were as it were looking at themselves from outside of themselves- again, ideas appropriate to a visionary experience rather than an actual personal encounter. And this is how the incident with Moses and Elijah began, for &ldquo;there&nbsp;<em>appeared unto them</em>&nbsp;Moses and Elijah talking with Him&rdquo; (:3). It was an appearance&nbsp;<em>unto them</em>, a vision which ended when they saw themselves from outside themselves and realized they were actually alone with Jesus. The language of &lsquo;appearance&rsquo; used throughout the records of the transfiguration would also suggest that the incident with Moses and Elijah was an appearance&nbsp;<em>to them</em>, in their eyes and perception, rather than necessarily in reality.</p>
<p><em>&quot;</em>To no one&quot; maybe connects with the fact that they saw &ldquo;no man&rdquo; except Jesus (:8); and so they are asked to tell the vision to &ldquo;no man&rdquo; until after the Lord&rsquo;s resurrection. It could be that the Lord wanted them to retain their focus upon Him by not telling others but instead meditating personally upon what they had seen. The vision had been of the Lord&rsquo;s resurrection glory- we noted above the similarities in language to the shining garments of the Angels at the resurrection scene. The Lord didn&rsquo;t want people to think that He had already attained that glory without the cross. Even though in prospect He had that glory, He was insistent that no impression be given that He could attain it without passing through the cross. This was particularly important for Peter to appreciate, who several times entertained a hope that glory was possible for the Lord without the cross.</p>
<p>The Synoptics each record the transfiguration. But did John? He saw it, and here he was commanded to tell it to others after the resurrection. It would be almost impossible for his Gospel record to not mention it. I have suggested that he actually begins his Gospel with the recollection of how he had seen the Lord&rsquo;s glory at the transfiguration (Jn. 1:14 &ldquo;we beheld His glory&rdquo;), and that the whole Gospel presents Jesus in &ldquo;glory&rdquo; and being &ldquo;beheld&rdquo; or &lsquo;seen&rsquo; in that glory.</p>
<p>Mark adds (Mk. 9:10) that &ldquo;they kept that saying with themselves, questioning one with another what the rising from the dead should mean&rdquo;. This comment indicates how secular they were; for the idea of bodily resurrection was well known within Judaism- the Pharisees believed that the dead would rise, although the Sadducees denied it. But the disciples were clearly unfamiliar with the idea, because they simply hadn&rsquo;t been seriously religious people. The word for &lsquo;questioning&rsquo; is used 10 times in the NT and always in a negative sense, mainly of the unbelieving Jews questioning the things of Christ. Thus it is used twice later in Mk. 9 (Mk. 9:14,16) about the Jews questioning about Jesus. Such questioning is so often an excuse for lack of faith, pressing for over-definition of everything as an excuse for disbelief. Instead of focusing on the glory of Jesus, they got distracted (wilfully) by semantics, words and meanings.</p>