This week’s gospel text marks the end of Jesus’ Galilean ministry and the beginning of the fulfillment of his mission in Jerusalem. Yet even as Jesus sets out on his divinely orchestrated, once and for all mission, Luke’s narrative takes care to draw definite parallels between the prophets of the past and Jesus’ words and actions. At the Transfiguration, Jesus had discussed his impending “departure” with Moses and Elijah (9:31). That departure is now defined as being “taken up” (“analempsis”), an image that would immediately bring to mind Elijah’s own miraculous ascension (2 Kings 2:10-11). Luke’s readers would also undoubtedly recall that it was just before his ascension that Elijah passed on the Spirit to his disciple Elisha, even as Jesus’ “ascension” will make possible the coming of th…