Year A: Epiphany Last | Matthew 17:1-9
St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church
February 15, 2026
the Rev. Jonathan Hanneman
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“This is my Son, the Beloved…listen to him!” – Matthew 17:5[1]
Along with the Ascension, Jesus’ Transfiguration is right up there with things in the Bible that just don’t make sense in the modern world. The Ascension becomes clearer when we begin thinking in terms of the ancient cosmos with its Three Realms: the Underworld, the Earthly Realm, and the Celestial Realm. Incarnation breaks a one-way hole in the wall separating the Celestial and Earthly Realms. Death is a preexisting one-way hole between the Earthly Realm and the Underworld. Resurrection begins the return trip route from the Underworld to the Earthly Realm, and the Ascensions visually completes the unification of the Three Realms under the Reign of the Heavens.
The Transfiguration, however, gives us no such straightforward explanation.
There’s lots of speculation about it—millennia-worth, to be fair. The most popular theory says that this is Jesus’ divinity revealing itself alongside his humanity. But to be honest, that involves much later theological wranglings reading themselves back onto the story. Others explain this as a theophany wherein the prophets, priests, and kings of the Hebrew Bible meet in the form of Elijah, Moses, and Jesus, the emphasis then being on Jesus as God’s Word made flesh.[2] For our era, the story looks like a sci-fi rendering where these three Biblical greats meet through some sort of elevation-based rift in time and space—Moses’ time on Sinai receiving the 10 Commandments meets Elijah’s mountain vision of the storm, earthquake, and “still small voice” meets Jesus, who’s also just climbed into the heights.
As for all those possibilities—and others—I can give them a good, solid “maybe?” The last one is a pretty far-fetched modern attempt at explaining a little understood ancient scene. The others have at least some history of theological support and interpretation to them, but, again, they both involve reading later emphases onto an earlier text, which means that Matthew’s original audience wouldn’t have understood what was happening that way.
So what would initial readers and listeners have heard in this story?
My best guess for what people in the 1st Century Roman Empire would have recognized here is a scene of imperial adoption. It’s been a while since we talked about ancient traditions surrounding adoption, so I should probably offer us a refresher before we go any further.
In Jesus’ era, adoption didn’t involve children. It was a formal contract between a “father”—the official leader of an entire extended family—and another adult man the father wished to be his legal heir and successor as head of the family. The firstborn son would be the natural heir, and if the father was pleased with that individual, there was no need for adoption. However, if the father had no natural heir or felt the natural heir wasn’t up for the task for whatever reason, he would adopt a new heir. Adoption might involve another son or extended family member, but it wasn’t radical to adopt someone with no genetic connection to you whatsoever.
The heir, now known as “the son,” had the job of learning how to become his adoptive father—watching and studying so that he not only understood and could recall the family history, tradition, and priorities, but working to fully embody who and what the father was—to become a living copy of the man who had become a living copy of the man who had become a living copy of generations of other men back to the founding of the family line.
In the Roman Empire, adoption generally involved a series formal, public announcements as to the status of the heir—basically an introduction, an approval of the heir’s progress, and then the formal handing over of authority. And on an imperial level, for the first century or so, all Roman Emperors had gained their position through adoption. That’s the likely reason that the Gospel of Mark—which scholars believe to be the oldest of the Gospels—begins with Jesus’ baptism. A birth narrative simply wasn’t necessary.[3] People would have recognized Jesus’ baptism as introducing the counter-imperial Kingdom of God through the initiation of an adoption wherein a Divine voice appoints God’s Heir. The manifestation of the dove would have provided a sharp contrast to the Emperor’s official insignia of war eagle, declaring God’s Reign to be utterly unlike the oppressive “peace” Rome claimed to offer the world.
The Transfiguration, then, appears to be the second of the adoption proclamations, one wherein the father grants the son not only his public approval but a measure of authority as well. The son can now function as the father’s representative. He isn’t the head of the family just yet—all of his actions still rest under the father’s authority. But if his choices and decisions fall in line with those of the father, they stand as if the father himself had made them.
In Matthew, a lot takes place between Jesus’ baptism and our scene today: the wilderness fasting and temptation, the calling of disciples, the Sermon on the Mount, a rash of healings, a resurrection, the naming of the Apostles, Sabbath-related challenges, a series of parables, John the Baptist’s imprisonment and execution, two miraculous feedings, storm calming and walking on water, the expansion of his mission beyond those ethnically Jewish, Peter’s confession, and, immediately preceding our passage, Jesus predicting his death and resurrection in Jerusalem. In all of these things, not only is Jesus teaching the disciples or providing us an example but is himself learning and growing as the Image of the Divine Father. He’s been embracing the role of heir and practicing how to embody of the nature of God’s greater family history, customs, and traditions. Now God, being satisfied with Jesus’ development and course of study, reaffirms the adoption in a similar manner to the first announcement, expanding the statement from Jesus’ baptism, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased,”[4] to include the authoritative command, “listen to him!”[5]
I find it interesting, then, to see what Jesus’ first words after that moment are. I mean, what would any of us do at that point? God says, “Good job,” and tells everyone to listen to you—to obey whatever you have to say? How would anyone in our age respond? “Get on your knees!”? “Do what I tell you!”? “Listen to me—or else!”?
But that isn’t what Jesus does. Instead, he continues to embody God’s nature and embrace the training his father has provided. He steps over to his terrified friends, reaches for their shaking hands, and gently says “Get up and do not be afraid”[6] or, more literally, “Be roused, and you all needn’t frighten yourselves.”[7]
In a time filled with sights that flash with terror and alarm, roaring voices attempting to drown out order and reason, and figures claiming authority to act like the greedy, violent gods they worship, it’s easy to follow the example of Peter, James, and John—to fall on our faces, cover our heads, and cower before Chaos and all its incarnations. Yet if we pause for a moment—if we look away from the deranged fear threatening to grind love, compassion, and kindness into the dirt—if, like Elijah, we succeed in quieting ourselves enough to hear Jesus’ still, small voice, what is it that we hear despite the spectacle? “Get up—you don’t need to be afraid.”
Jesus still stands beside us. The Divine still walks among us. The primal Spirit of Love and Peace—the Creator’s Breath—still rests upon us, ready to restore our lungs and throats with its healing air. Empires rise and rage and fall. Disorder floods and ebbs. People who raise defiant fists to Heaven soon enough fade into the dust. But Jesus’ words remain.
The present is hard; fear is strong; and the future stands shrouded in smoke and shadow. Yet know that this is in no way the end. Take the rest you badly need. Recover your strength and courage, but recognize you do still have both things. Turn off the noise. Turn off the news. Today has trouble enough for itself. Take the space you need to let your inner tempest calm. Close your eyes. Feel your own breath. Let the waves settle, then listen to the voice of our Lord—our Provider.
Open your eyes again, and see the truth before you. Reach for Jesus’ outstretched hand. “Get up.” You can do it; terror, cruelty, and oppression—all expressions of sin—have no claim on you. “Get up.” You do have the strength. Breathe. Gather your energy, your confidence. “Get up,” and live the Gospel—give body to all the beauty and power and goodness of our God—with boldness. Train your ears on the voice of the living Heir, and get up—we need not be afraid! Stand up; attend to God’s affirmation today. Embrace the Divine mandate; make your life its model:
“This is my Son, the Beloved…listen to him!”
[1] All Bible quotations are from the NRSVue unless otherwise noted.
[2] A related idea would be the Law (Moses) and Prophets (Elijah) meeting in the Word (Jesus).
[3] It wasn’t until the later 1st Century CE that a biological son of an emperor became emperor himself. Once that happened, the later Gospels needed to include a sort of genetic component as well as the adoption to ensure people made the same connections.
[4] Matthew 3:17
[5] Matthew 17:5
[6] Matthew 17:7
[7] Ibid. | My translation