Although the rainbow is a spectacular sight for man, the assurance we have that there will never be another global flood comes from God. He is the one who will ‘remember’ His covenant.

After the Flood, Noah and all the Ark’s human and animal passengers disembarked. Then God made the Noahic Covenant. Then, as the historical account reads, God provided a sign for His covenant with Noah’s family and all living creatures—the rainbow:

And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.” (Genesis 9:12–17)

Coming from the sun shining through the dark clouds, the rainbow symbolized the heavenly pervading the earthly. And as it spans the horizon, it reminds man that God’s covenant is universal, as was the Flood that will never recur.¹

Although the rainbow is a spectacular sight for man, the assurance we have that there will never be another global flood comes from God. He is the one who will ‘remember’ His covenant. Note that God ‘remembering’ doesn’t mean that he had previously forgotten; rather, it is an idiom meaning that the rainbow would signify that He is acting again on behalf of the Covenant beneficiaries, ensuring that no subsequent flood would become global.

Rainbows before the Flood?

The Noahic Covenant was certainly the first mention of the rainbow. But the Bible is silent on whether they had previously occurred. However, there are some considerations that suggest there would have been rainbows, which will be addressed in turn: the science of the rainbow, the natural laws that operated before and after the Flood, and God’s sovereign authority to ordain meanings to phenomena.

The science of the rainbow

Rainbows are the result of well-known physics. When light enters at an angle into a substance where it travels more slowly (like a prism),² different wavelengths are bent differently. This effect is called dispersion. Since colour depends on wavelength, we see this as a band of different colours. The shorter wavelengths (violet and blue) are bent the most, the longer wavelengths (red and orange) are bent the least.

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