But it presupposes and supplements the covenant with man subsisting from the very beginning. The covenant here ostensibly refers to the one point of the absence, for all time to come, of any danger to the human race from a deluge. Here freedom and immutability of purpose meet. While man looks on the bow to recall the promise of God, God himself looks on it to remember and perform this promise.
"And I will look upon it to remember." The Scripture is most unhesitating and frank in ascribing to God all the attributes and exercises of personal freedom. "In the cloud." When a shower-cloud is spread over the sky, the bow appears, if the sun, the cloud, and the spectator are in the proper relation to one another. But it is now mentioned for the first time, because it now becomes the fitting sign of security from another universal deluge, which is the special blessing of the covenant in its present form. "Have I given." The rainbow existed as long as the present laws of light and air.
In these respects it is a beautiful emblem of mercy rejoicing against judgment, of light from heaven irradiating and beatifying the soul, of grace always sufficient for the need of the reunion of earth and heaven, and of the universality of the offer of salvation. It forms a perfect arch, extends as far as the shower extends, connects heaven and earth, and spans the horizon. It consists of heavenly light, variegated in hue, and mellowed in lustre, filling the beholder with an involuntary pleasure. It comes with its mild radiance only when the cloud condenses into a shower. There could not, therefore, be a more beautiful or fitting token that there shall be no more a flood to sweep away all flesh and destroy the land. The rainbow is thus an index that the sky is not wholly overcast, since the sun is shining through the shower, and thereby demonstrating its partial extent. A beautiful arch of reflected and refracted light is in this way formed for every eye. It is caused by the rays of the sun reflected from the falling raindrops at a particular angle to the eye of the spectator.
"My bow." As God's covenant is the well-known and still remembered compact formed with man when the command was issued in the Garden of Eden, so God's bow is the primeval arch, coexistent with the rays of light and the drops of rain. What is to happen when the race of man is completed, is not the question at present. "For perpetual ages." This stability of sea and land is to last during the remainder of the human period. As God looks upon the bow that he may remember the covenant, so should we, that we also may be ever mindful of the covenant with faith and thankfulness.īarnes' Notes on the BibleThe token of the covenant is now pointed out. 3d, The rainbow appears when one part of the sky is clear, which intimates mercy remembered in the midst of wrath, and the clouds are hemmed, as it were, with the rainbow, that they may not overspread the heavens for the bow is coloured rain, or the edges of a cloud gilded. 2d, The rainbow appears when the clouds are most disposed to wet when we have most reason to fear the rain prevailing, God shows this seal of the promise that it shall not prevail. Nay, as if the Eternal Mind needed a memorandum, I will look upon it that I may remember the everlasting covenant, Genesis 9:16. And I will remember my covenant, that the waters shall no more become a flood, Genesis 9:15. It shall be seen in the cloud, Genesis 9:14, and it shall be a token of the covenant, Genesis 9:12-13. Now, observe, 1st, This seal is affixed with repeated assurances of the truth of that promise, which it was designed to be the ratification of I do set my bow in the cloud, Genesis 9:13. I set my bow in the clouds - The rainbow, it is likely, was seen in the clouds before, but was never a seal of the covenant till now.
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