between husband and wife the same was experientially true for Jesus and his bride the
Church or individual Christians. Once again this reminds readers what was
discovered in chapter 2, that ravishment for the Puritans possessed both a physical
and spiritual dimension. Therefore, I conclude that the Puritan usage of ravishment
was not abusive or violent, as the term would be understood today.^60 Rather they
fully understood the serious and pervasiveness of sin and rebellion and the deep allure
the world had on those who lived on earth. They also recognized the necessary power
of God’s love that was required to attract a person to Christ and repulse the
destructive nature of worldliness.
Ambrose’s yearning for God also reveals a degree of eros reflective of earlier
mystical writers. When writing about the connection between prayer and love to God
he passionately pleads, “[o] burn and consume whatsoever would grow one with our
souls beside thee; O let the fire of thy spirit so wholly turn our soules into a spiritual
fire that the dross of the flesh and the world being wholly consumed” and “[s]et us on
fire, burn us, make us anew and transform us, that nothing besides thee may live in
us; O wound very deeply our hearts with the dart of thy love.”^61 My reading of
Ambrose confirms Alvin Plantinga’s assessment, “[e]ven (and perhaps especially) the
Puritans, dour and emotionally pinched as they are often represented, are full of
expressions of erotic love of God.”^62 Once again Ambrose demonstrates the critical
role of the Spirit in his theology, as he urgently longs for God and begs for the flames
(^60) Cohen comes to the same conclusion in (^) God’s Caress, 239-41.
(^61) Ambrose, Media (1657), 465, cf. 491 on the benefit of wounding the soul. cf. 264
on the role of the Spirit and heavenly flames. (^62) Plantinga, Testimonial Model, 313.