Mary the Chariot of Elijah

[DL82]

It struck me today while praying the Rosary that Our Lady has in some ways a similarity with the chariot of fire that took Elijah/Elias to heaven.

Besides being assumed into heaven body and soul, like Elijah, there is the whole issue of Our Lord identifying John the Baptist as the Elijah who would come before to prepare the way.

When Mary visits Elizabeth, John leaps inside her womb, perhaps receiving from her and from her Son this mission as the new Elijah.

Have any of the saints referred to Our Lady in this way? It’s not one of the many titles in the Litany of Loreto.

Is this a strech too far? If this meditation is not of God, may it fall and pass away.

 

[bpbasilphx]

I see why you say this, and I do think it’s a stretch, but I wouldn’t tattle to Torquemada about you.

 

[AveSantaMaria]

Yes!!

Look into the Origins of the Carmelites:

“Who would doubt that what the prophet [Elijah] preached on Mount Carmel referred specifically to Mary? For when the fire (which is the love of God) descended on Mary - about which it says ‘I have come to send fire on earth’ [Luke 12:49] - it utterly consumed with fire the errors of idols and afterwards through Mary showers of pity and grace fell on what had been dried up and in this way restored it all. And so the fire of Divine Love came upon Mary and in this way her womb was on fire. And just as Elijah was swept up in a fiery chariot, so the Son of God was taken up in the Virgin’s womb as in a fiery chariot. In this way the House of God is on fire, as the prophet says: ‘The house of Jacob is a fire and the house of Joseph is a flame’ [Obadiah 18]. Therefore behold on the mountain the feet of one who brings good tidings and announces peace (that is Elijah); that is to say, through Mary, through whom the showers of grace fell from heaven. [1]”

carmelite.org/chronology/mantleofelijah.htm