Genesis 9:1-7
Fill the earth again
The blessing given at creation is given a second time, with new terms about life and blood attached to it.
Objects of the Bible
The bow in the cloud
A weapon hung up in the sky, pointed away, as the sign of a promise made to everything that breathes.
The word the account uses is the ordinary word for a war bow, not a special word for a rainbow. It is set in the cloud, and the covenant it signs is not made with Noah alone but with every living creature and with the earth itself. The most striking line is about who the sign is for. It is not hung there so that people will remember. The text says that when the bow appears, God will look at it and remember.
Scroll down to the story
The movements, in the order the text gives them.
The story of The bow in the cloud
- 01
- 02
Genesis 9:8-11
Never again by water
The promise is stated as a limit on judgment, and it is given without conditions on the other side.
- 03
Genesis 9:12-17
I will look upon it
The sign faces the wrong way to be a reminder for people. It is described as something God sees.
Why it matters
This is the first covenant in Scripture with a visible sign attached, and it establishes the pattern: a promise, a sign, and the sign belonging to the one who made the promise rather than to the one who received it. Every later sign of covenant, in circumcision, in a Sabbath, in bread and a cup, is standing on this.
1 song
The music
Every song in the catalogue whose passage falls inside these chapters.
