The chapter opens six days after the events of the previous chapter, which take place in the region of Caesarea Philippi, near the southwestern base of Mount Hermon. Matthew in verse 16:21 states that Jesus must go to Jerusalem, but this journey does not properly begin until Matthew 19:1. With Peter, James and John, he goes to a high mountain, traditionally understood and commemorated as Mount Tabor,[2] where he is transfigured. Mount Tabor is in the south of Galilee.[3] By verse 14 they have returned to a location where the crowd is gathered, verse 22 notes that they are still in Galilee, and in verse 24 they have returned to Capernaum at the northern end of the Sea of Galilee.
James Burton Coffman suggests that the location of the transfiguration would have been either Mount Hermon, closer to Caesarea Philippi, "or one of its adjacent peaks": "Mount Tabor, in the days of Christ and the apostles was populated and had a fortress on top of it; and Christ's taking his apostles there would not have been taking them 'apart', as Matthew said" (Matthew 17:1 in the King James Version), nor was Mount Tabor a particularly "high" mountain.[4]
Now after six days Jesus took Peter, James, and John his brother, led them up on a high mountain by themselves.[8]
In Luke's gospel, the account of the transfiguration of Jesus comes about eight days after the previous events. Protestant theologian Heinrich Meyer notes, in accordance with the observations of "Chrysostom, Jerome, Theophylact, Erasmus, and many others ... that Luke has included the dies a quo and ad quem" (i.e. inclusive of the days at the start and end of the interval).[9]
Verse 2
And He was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and His clothes became as white as the light.[10]
Some versions state "white as snow" rather than "white as the light".[11][12] The Jerusalem Bible notes that the angel of the resurrection in Matthew 28:3 wore a robe which was "white as snow".[13]