In the last issue of this article, I began sharing St. John Chrysostom’s thoughts about the supernatural Light of Tabor. His thoughts seem, however, to have an apparent inconsistency. In another passage, he states with equal clarity that the righteous at the Last Day will see Christ, not merely as His disciples had seen Him on Tabor, but “in the very glory of the Father.” For He will not came that way again. On Tabor, so as to spare His disciples, He disclosed only as much of His brightness as they were able to endure (we pray this in the Tropar of the feast); whereas later He shall come in the very glory of the Father, not   only with Moses and Elias, but also with the infinite angelic hosts, with archangels, with cherubim, with those infinite heavenly companies.

Thus, “the very glory of the Father”, which is here referred to as an even greater glory than that which was revealed at the Transfiguration, will be revealed only at the Last Day. There is a difference between the glory of Christ on Tabor and the glory of the Second Coming according to John.

Now this apparent inconsistency is resolved only when one looks more closely at the context in which this second passage appears. First, it is important simply to note that both passages come from the very same homily. What Chrysostom is actually saying here is that the revelation of Christ’s glory at the Last Day will not be on the humble scale of Tabor – where we have an intimate disclosure of Christ’s divine glory before two prophets and three disciples – but rather that it will be of such cosmic proportions that it will involve the infinite myriads of the heavenly Powers. Scholars believe that the underlying           presupposition here is that the greater the participation in Christ’s glory, the greater the     manifestation of that glory. Hence, Christ’s glory at the Last Day will be greater than that of Tabor because it will also reveal His glory to the heavenly hosts, suffused with and bearing witness to the divine glory of Christ. It is the manifestation of the full majesty of Christ’s heavenly status according to Chrysostom.

Why, you might ask, should any of this be important to us. I think it is important because it highlights one of the important marks of a true Christian person, namely the thinking about our faith in a very serious manner. Having God on our minds and wrestling with Who we think He is, draws us ever closer to Him and brings us into communion with Him.