FK: Your first sentence is within time, but your second is not. If, to borrow a phrase :), "all time for God is NOW", which I have never disputed, then Jesus on the cross "happened" across all time
FK, God's salvation comes under the Divine Economy, which is in real time and real space. You are mixing up theology and divine economy, or maybe the Protestant world knows nothing about the latter. To them it may all as well be magic.
Christ was not a holographic projection, an illusion of man, and His death was not a magic trick. Until His death, in real time and in real place, on the Cross, no one could be free from death, neither those who died prior to this moment, nor those who were going to die.
Kosta: My only problem is with the appearance of Moses at Mt. Tabor
FK: There it is. You raise an excellent point. If the sacrifice applied to Moses when he lived, then he would have been eligible to make that appearance
But the Church teaches that after His death on the Cross Christ descended into Hell and freed the OT righteous. The Apostolic Creed, as well as the 3rd century Syrian Creed, says that "He descended into hell." (or to the dead).
There are many biblical references to this indirectly. The best known ones are 1 Pet 4:6 "the gospel was preached also to those who are dead," 1 Pet 3:19 "he went and preached to the spirits in prison," Eph 4:8-10 ""When he ascended on high, he led captives in his train and gave gifts to men."(What does "he ascended" mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions? He who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.)"
None of this explains how could Moses appear on Mount Tabor, unless he was not among those captives. His appearance contradicts the notion that none was free from the chains of death brought on to mankind through Adam's sin until Christ offered His body as ransom for our freedom.
Let me know if you find any patristics on Moses at Transfiguration, please.
My knee jerk reaction is that the Transfiguration was a prophetic vision, given the three apostles, of the futire ascension of Christ into glory, rather than the event contemporaneous with the trip to Mount Tabor.
"Divine economy" means different things to different people, but if you are talking about an extra-scriptural man-made tradition, then you're right that I'm probably not familiar with it.
Until His death, in real time and in real place, on the Cross, no one could be free from death, neither those who died prior to this moment, nor those who were going to die.
So your model has God punishing those who were not fortunate enough to die after Christ did. Interesting. Doesn't this violate your ideas of God's fundamental fairness?
But the Church teaches that after His death on the Cross Christ descended into Hell and freed the OT righteous. The Apostolic Creed, as well as the 3rd century Syrian Creed, says that "He descended into hell." (or to the dead).
I have never agreed with this interpretation of the Creed that Christ LITERALLY went to hell. The suffering Christ went through for us WAS "hell". Plus, it would violate John 19:30: "It is finished", AND Luke 23:46: "Father, into Thy hands I commit My spirit."
In any event, if He physically died at around 3 p.m., and the new day started at 6 p.m., then He couldn't have spent very long in hell if He was going to keep His promise to the thief. :)