And, behold. The exclamation, thrice repeated (Matthew 17:5), marks the suddenness and unexpectedness of the occurrence. They who now appeared were no delusive, imaginary figures, but real personages, objectively presented to the spectators, in such bodies as appertained to their condition.
Moses and Elias. St. Luke adds, "who appeared in glory," radiant with the light which always accompanies heavenly visitors. Why these two saints were chosen to be present on this momentous occasion may be explained by various considerations.
Both these worthies experienced something unparalleled in their departure from this life. Elijah was taken up to heaven without dying; Moses died, indeed, but he was buried by God in an unknown grave, and his body was under the especial care of Michael the archangel (see Jud Luke 1:9), and we know not that it saw corruption.
From the unseen world these were brought to do homage to the Messiah—Moses, a type of those blessed spirits who in Paradise await the final consummation, Elijah, a type of the saints who, after the resurrection, perfect in soul and body, shall enter into glory.
Here were the representatives of the Law and the prophets, the principal supporters of the old covenant, honouring him who was introducing the new covenant, which was to fulfil and supersede the previous one.
Spurious, degraded Judaism rejected Christ's claims; real, orthodox Judaism acknowledged him and reverenced him as the Christ foretold and fort, shadowed, "of whom Moses and the prophets did write" (John 1:45).
Now, too, it was made manifest that Jesus was not Elias or one of the prophets, as some erroneously had supposed, but different from and superior to all; that he had power over life and death, and could bring whom he would from the unseen World; that the cross and Passion were not degrading, or proofs of weakness, but glorious and triumphant accomplishments of the will or God.
The question is asked—How did Peter and the rest recognize the two heavenly visitants? There may have been something conventional in their garb or appearance, which at once identified them; or the apostles may have known them by spiritual intuition or special revelation; or they may have gathered their knowledge from the conversation which they overheard.
Anyhow, it was necessary that the two should be recognized, otherwise their appearance would have lost its significance, and the confirmation which they were intended to afford would fail to be given.
Is there here an intimation that in heaven the blessed will know each other, though they never met in the flesh—shall know even as they have been known? Talking with him. St. Luke tells us the subject of this mysterious dialogue—they "spoke of his decease ( ἐ ìξοδον, exodus, departure) which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem."
They conversed, not of the glory which was his before the world began, nor of the kingdom which he came to establish, but of his coming suffering and death, with their tremendous issues. At the very moment of this revelation of Divinity, the discourse is of humiliation and the cross.
The apostles had been slow to understand the future that awaited their Master; here the great saints of the covenant bore their testimony to Christ's fulfilment of what had been prophesied and shadowed aforehand, how by the sufferings of his sacred humanity eternal glory should be won.
So might the apostles be strengthened to look forward without apprehension or weak shrinking; for through the grave and gate of death lay the road to a joyful resurrection and celestial happiness.