Voices and influences
Ambrose of Milan
A Roman governor drafted into a bishop's chair before he was even baptized, who made an emperor stand outside the church door until he repented of a massacre.
Summary
This site quotes Ambrose of Milan 908 times across 50 books, and lists 0 works.
- Lived died 397.
- Quoted here most in Luke: 271 of 908.
Ambrose of Milan
- Lived
- died 397
- Tradition
- Patristic
5 of 908 quotations
Own words
Quoted in full, because Ambrose of Milan died in 397 and these works are out of copyright. Each citation below names its edition and its year. A citation naming a modernised text means that edition makes its own editorial changes, and that edition's terms are not in this site's record.
Christ, then, is the beginning of our virtue. He is the beginning of purity, who taught maidens not to look for the embraces of humanity but to yield the purity of their bodies and minds to the service of the Holy Spirit rather than to…
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a husband. Christ is the beginning of frugality, for he became poor, though he was rich. Christ is the beginning of patience, for when he was reviled, he reviled not again. When he was struck, he did not strike back. Christ is the beginning of humility, for he took the form of a servant, though in the majesty of his power he was equal with God the Father. From him each various virtue has taken its origin.For this cause, then, that we might learn these different virtues, "a son was given us, whose beginning was upon his shoulder." That "beginning" is the Lord's cross—the beginning of strong courage, wherewith a way has been opened for the holy martyrs to enter the sufferings of the holy war.
Isaiah 9:6 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon His shoulders. And He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. BSB
Therefore, in order to call the Gentiles to the grace of his resurrection (for it is indeed a rich and fertile land that produces eternal fruits, fruits a hundred and sixty times over), he subjected his shoulder to work, subjecting himself to the cross, in…
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order to carry our sins. And so the Prophet says: His authority is on his shoulder (Isaiah 9:6), that is, the power of divinity over the bodily passion, or the cross surpassing the body. Therefore, he placed his shoulder on the plow, enduring all insults, subjected to labor in such a way that he was wounded because of our iniquities, and weakened because of our sins.
Isaiah 9:6 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon His shoulders. And He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. BSB
Accordingly, even at that time, the cross that was to come was prefigured in sign; and at the same time that he was stripped of his tunic, that is, of the flesh he took on, he was stripped of the handsome diversity of colors that…
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represented the virtues. Therefore his tunic, that is, his flesh, was stained with blood, but not his divinity; and his enemies were able to take from him his covering of flesh but not his immortal life.
Genesis 37:23 So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe—the robe of many colors he was wearing— BSB
Moses indeed killed the Egyptian and became a fugitive from the land of Egypt, in order to avoid the tyrant of that land.
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But he would not have killed that Egyptian man before he had first killed the Egyptian man of spiritual wickedness within himself, and had renounced the luxury of regal honors, considering the reproach of Christ a greater inheritance than the treasures of Egypt.
Exodus 2:12 After looking this way and that and seeing no one, he struck down the Egyptian and hid his body in the sand. BSB
A wish is a request for blessings from God with a promise to fulfill a duty. And so, when you obtain what you have asked for, it is ungrateful to delay the promise.
Deuteronomy 23:21 If you make a vow to the LORD your God, do not be slow to keep it, because He will surely require it of you, and you will be guilty of sin. BSB
Influence, on the record
This site quotes Ambrose of Milan 908 times across 50 books.
This site’s own count of what it does with the voice
The life, in order
The life told as one accountfrom this site's record
Ambrose was born about 339 at Trier, where his father served as praetorian prefect of Gaul — one of the four or five highest offices in the Western empire. The father died young and the family went back to Rome. Ambrose was trained in law and Greek, entered the imperial service, and by about 372 was governor of Aemilia and Liguria, with his seat at Milan. Milan was then the working capital of the West, where the emperor actually lived. In 374 the bishop of Milan died, and the city split. The Arian party and the Nicene party each packed the basilica, and it looked like a riot. The governor went in to keep order and make a speech about calm. Someone in the crowd — the tradition says a child — called out, Ambrose for bishop, and both sides took it up. He was thirty-five, a career administrator, and not baptized. He tried to get out of it. He was baptized, ordained through every clerical rank in eight days, and consecrated bishop on 7 December 374. He gave his land to the church and the rest of his money to the poor, hired a priest named Simplicianus to teach him theology, and started reading Greek Christian writers no one in the Latin West had absorbed yet — Origen, Basil, Athanasius. He learned the job in public, at speed. He turned out to be extraordinary at it. He preached every Sunday and taught the congregation to sing: antiphonal hymns, two sides of the church answering each other, an Eastern practice he planted in the West. Some of the hymns are his own and are still sung. Augustine, who heard him, says he wept at the singing and could not stop. He also decided that the church was not a department of the state, and he made it stick three times. In 385 and again in 386 the Empress Justina, an Arian, demanded that one of Milan's basilicas be handed over for Arian worship, with her son the boy-emperor Valentinian II behind the order. Ambrose refused. Imperial troops surrounded the church. He and the congregation stayed inside, day and night, and he taught them the hymns to keep their courage up through the siege. He sent back the line that made the position permanent: the emperor is within the church, not above it. The troops withdrew. He pressed the same claim in 388 over Callinicum, where a mob of Christians had burned a synagogue and Theodosius ordered the bishop to pay for rebuilding it — a just order, and Ambrose fought it until the emperor gave way. It is the ugliest episode in his record and should be named as what it is. Then came Thessalonica. In 390 a riot there killed the imperial garrison commander, and Theodosius answered by turning his soldiers loose on the crowd in the circus. Something like seven thousand people were killed in a few hours. Ambrose wrote him a private letter — it survives — telling him he could not celebrate the Eucharist in his presence until he repented publicly, and that David had been a great king and still said, I have sinned. When the emperor came to the church in Milan, the bishop met him at the door and did not let him in. Theodosius, master of the Roman world, took off his imperial robes, stood among the penitents for months, and was readmitted at Christmas. No one had seen anything like it. It set a precedent the West lived under for a thousand years: there is a bar the state does not cross, and someone will be standing at the door. His other lasting work was quieter. He wrote On the Duties of the Clergy, a Christian answer to Cicero's book on duty, and treatises on the Holy Spirit and on the sacraments that carried Greek theology into Latin. And he preached the sermons that a rhetoric professor named Augustine came to hear for the technique. Ambrose showed him how to read the Old Testament without stumbling over its surface, took his confession, and baptized him at Easter 387. He kept his door open, ate almost nothing, and worked past exhaustion. He died on Good Friday, 4 April 397, and Milan filled with people who had watched a governor become a shepherd. Sources: Paulinus of Milan, Life of Saint Ambrose; Ambrose, Letters (including Letter 51 to Theodosius); Augustine, Confessions, books 5–9; Theodoret, Ecclesiastical History; Philip Schaff, ed., Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series II, vol. 10.
908 quotations across 50 books
Where this voice is quoted
Even on his bed he plots wickedness; he sets himself on a path that is not good; he fails to reject evil.
“Moreover, he meditated wickedness in his bed, where he should have sought the truth. For in our beds, we should remorse our sins, not commit them by our very actions, as the Prophet says: "What you utter in your hearts, and in your beds you…”
Your loving devotion, O LORD, reaches to the heavens, Your faithfulness to the clouds.
“Therefore, mercy must be sought from heaven, and the truth of God must be gathered from the oracles of the prophets, who, like clouds, cover the mysteries of divine knowledge.”
Your righteousness is like the highest mountains; Your judgments are like the deepest sea. O LORD, You preserve man and beast.
“You will save people and animals, O Lord; for you have multiplied your mercy, O God. What are people and animals? Some are rational, others irrational. Rational beings are subject to judgment, while irrational beings receive mercy. Some are ruled, others are nurtured.”
How precious is Your loving devotion, O God, that the children of men take refuge in the shadow of Your wings!
“But the sons of men will hope in the protection of your wings; that is, not the generation of vipers, but the sons of men who live in the image and likeness of God.”
They feast on the abundance of Your house, and You give them drink from Your river of delights.
“They will be intoxicated with the abundance of your house, and you will give them to drink from the torrent of your pleasure.”
Let not the foot of the proud come against me, nor the hand of the wicked drive me away.
“And because he had spoken of pride, he added: And let not the hand of sinners move me. For just as the limbs are of Christ, so the limbs are of the devil.”
Do not fret over those who do evil; do not envy those who do wrong.
“Not infrequently good people, seeing others arrive at riches and honors by fraud and trickery, become green with jealousy and want to imitate them.”
Trust in the LORD and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness.
“(Verse 3.) Therefore the Prophet rightly says: Hope in the Lord, and do good; and you shall inhabit the land, and shall be fed with its riches.”
Delight yourself in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart.
“(Verse 4.) Therefore, he says: Delight in the Lord, and he will grant you the desires of your heart. Why did he not say 'your desires' but 'the desires of your heart'?”
Commit your way to the LORD; trust in Him, and He will do it. He will bring forth your righteousness like the dawn, your justice like the noonday sun.
“(Vers. 5, 6.) Reveal your way to the Lord, and hope in Him, and He will act. And He will bring forth your righteousness like the light, and your justice like the noonday. This single verse declares what kind of person you should be.”
Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for Him; do not fret when men prosper in their ways, when they carry out wicked schemes.
“(Verse 7.) Be subject to the Lord and beseech Him. Not only should you be subject to God, but also beseech the Lord, so that you can fulfill your desire for submission, as it also says above: Reveal your way to the Lord and hope…”
Refrain from anger and abandon wrath; do not fret—it can only bring harm.
“Anger destroys not just the ordinary run of people, but even the wise. David warns the wise, saying to them, "Cease from anger," for once that fire is set alight it will not cease until its flames have consumed you.”
For the evildoers will be cut off, but those who hope in the LORD will inherit the land.
“(Verse 9.) Therefore, do not listen to him, so that you do not act wickedly. For those who act wickedly will be exterminated. Those who do not have roots will be exterminated, like vegetables or hay.”
Yet a little while, and the wicked will be no more; though you look for them, they will not be found.
“(Verse 10.) But because he did not want to be redeemed through these means, and he believes he should persist in sin, of him the Prophet says: 'And yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be: and thou shalt seek his place, and…”
But the meek will inherit the land and delight in abundant prosperity.
“(Verse 11.) But the meek shall possess the land, and shall delight in the abundance of peace. They rightfully possess the land in which God himself rests; as was revealed by the divine oracle through Isaiah, saying: Upon whom shall I rest, if not upon…”
The wicked scheme against the righteous and gnash their teeth at them, but the Lord laughs, seeing that their day is coming.
“(Vers. 12, 13.) It follows: The sinner will observe the just and will gnash his teeth over him. But the Lord will deride him; for He sees that his day is coming.”
The wicked have drawn the sword and bent the bow to bring down the poor and needy, to slay those whose ways are upright.
“(Verse 14.) Moreover, he adds: Behold, they have unsheathed the sword, sinners have bent their bow, to cast down the needy and the destitute. What is the sword of the sinner, if not the opposite of the sword of the Holy Spirit?”
Better is the little of the righteous than the abundance of many who are wicked.
“(Vers. 16.) It is better to be a little just, than to have many riches from the sins of the wicked. Therefore, riches are not condemned, but the riches of sinners; unless perhaps because a sinner said: All these things have been delivered to me…”
For the arms of the wicked will be broken, but the LORD upholds the righteous.
“(Verse 17.) For the arms, he says, of the sinners will be broken. So that their actions cannot bring any impediment to the righteous; so that the rod of the sinners is not left over the lot of the righteous.”
But the wicked and enemies of the LORD will perish like the glory of the fields. They will vanish; like smoke they will fade away.
“(Verse 20.) They are gone like smoke that is gone. The Greek 'ἐξέλιπον' means, they have failed. You see someone suddenly come to power and receive honors; you regard them as lofty.”
The wicked borrow and do not repay, but the righteous are gracious and giving.
“(Verse 21.) The sinner borrows and does not repay; but the righteous shows mercy and gives. This also applies to the person of Paul, because the righteous shows mercy and gives. See how he divides the Lord's words, see how he lends the Lord's silver.”
Surely those He blesses will inherit the land, but the cursed will be destroyed.
“(Verse 22.) Therefore, the righteous is good; and for this reason, Scripture adds: For those who bless him shall possess the land; but those who curse him shall be destroyed.”
The steps of a man are ordered by the LORD who takes delight in his journey.
“(Verse 23.) The steps of a man are established by the Lord. The Greek word διαβήματα means 'steps' or 'transitions'. And therefore it is said to you: If you pass through water, rivers will not stop you (Isaiah 43:2).”
I once was young and now am old, yet never have I seen the righteous abandoned or their children begging for bread.
“If you take it at face value, the meaning is obvious: in his own lifetime, David never saw the just forsaken. But a lifespan is brief, and the statement is moreover incredible.”
They are ever generous and quick to lend, and their children are a blessing.
“(Verse 26.) But how can he be in need who has mercy and lends all day? What is it that the righteous person lends? Not bronze, not iron, not lead, but silver purified by fire.”