Abstract

This article argues that Augustine’s choice of verb tense for the phrase transfigurauit in se offers a sacramental dimension to his doctrine of the totus Christus, the whole Christ with Christ as Head and the Church as Body. While the apostle Paul chooses the future tense, transfigurauit, to locate the transformation of the Church in eternity, Augustine shifts the verb tense to the perfect, thus stretching the eschatological transformation back into the historical event of the Incarnation. Augustine’s writings emphasize, however, that the transformation culminates in eternity, thus giving rise to the question of why he chooses the perfect tense. This article asserts that the grammatical shift is a theological move that reveals the sacramental dimension of the totus Christus. It considers Augustine’s use of the word transitus to describe Christ’s passage through life on earth in the Incarnation. As the Body of Christ, the Church extends Christ’s passage through earthly life, thus the transitus that was completed with the resurrection and ascension of Christ actually continues to take place in the present. And neither the transitus nor the transformation it brings will be completed until the Church foliows Christ in his ascension into heaven. Thus, the union of the totus Christus is a sacramental reality that transcends time, bringing eternal realities into the present because of past actions. The article concludes that Augustine intentionally manipulares the verb tense in order to express the sacramental dimension of the unión of Christ and the Church as each generation of Christians is transformed anew by Christ in his transitus.