What is the meaning of a rainbow in the Bible?
What is the meaning of a rainbow in the Bible? What do colors like red, blue and purple mean?
Interestingly, we only have to search three places in the Bible to find out the meaning of a rainbow and what certain colors they can symbolize. These places of study are found in the books of Genesis, Ezekiel and Revelation.
In the Genesis account, a rainbow appears immediately after the great world flood brought in order to remove the sinful and wicked man from the earth. It symbolized God's mercy and the covenant he made with Noah (representing humanity) not to destroy the world again in this way.
And God said, "This is the sign of the covenant I make between you and every living creature with you, for eternal generations: I put my rainbow in the cloud and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth ... and the waters no longer have to become a deluge to destroy all the flesh (Genesis 9:12, 15, HBFV).
In a sense, a cloud that contains the arch depicts God, as Exodus 13 states, "And the Lord preceded them by day in a pillar of cloud to open the way ..." (Exodus 13:21).
Double rainbow inside an Alaskan state park
In his first vision of God, known as the vision "rotates in the middle of a wheel", the prophet Ezekiel compares the glory of God to what he saw. He states, "As the rainbow in the cloud appears on the rainy day, so was the appearance of His brightness all around" (Ezekiel 1:28).
The arches appear again in the prophetic book of Revelation, which predicts the end of man's dominion over the earth and the coming of Jesus to establish his Kingdom. The first mention in Revelation appears when the apostle John uses it to describe the glory and power of God on his throne.
After these things I looked, and behold, an open door to heaven. . . And He who was seated looked like a jasper stone and a Sardinian stone; and a rainbow was around the throne. . . (Revelation 4: 1, 3)
The second mention of a rainbow occurs when John describes the appearance of a powerful angel.
Then I saw another strong angel coming down from heaven, dressed with a cloud and a rainbow on his head; and his face was like the sun, and his feet were like pillars of fire (Revelation 10: 1).
The most common colors seen by nudes are, as listed by Isaac Newton: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and purple. In English, a popular way of remembering these colors is to memorize the name "ROY G. BIV". The primary colors are red, yellow, green, blue and purple.
Symbolism of colors
The colors of the rainbow red, purple (which is a mix of red and blue) and scarlet (a bright red) and crimson (a colder shade of the red color) have been widely used in the tabernacle made by Moses in the desert. They were also part of the later built temple and in the guise of the High Priest and other priests (Exodus 25: 3 - 5, 36: 8, 19, 27:16, 28: 4 - 8, 39: 1 - 2, etc. ). These colors were atonement types or shadows.
The purple and scarlet colors can signify or represent iniquity or sinfulness (Revelation 17: 3 - 4, 18:16, etc.). Purple itself was used as a symbol of royalty (Judges 8:26). Scarlet alone can represent prosperity (Proverbs 31:21, Lamentations 4: 5).
The blue color, referred to directly or when the scriptures claim that something is similar to the appearance of a sapphire or a sapphire stone, can be a symbol of divinity or royalty (Numbers 4: 5 - 12, Ezekiel 1: 26, Esther 8:15, etc.).
Blue was also the color that God commanded that some threads in the fringes of the Israelite garments be colored to remind them of the commandments and live a divine lifestyle (Numbers 15:38 - 39).
The white color found in a rainbow can mean holiness, justice and dedication in serving the true God (Leviticus 16: 4, 2 Chronicles 5:12, etc.). In the vision, Jesus appears for the first time to the apostle John with white hair (Revelation 1:12 - 14).
All believers throughout history who die in the faith, according to the Bible, will rise and receive white robes to wear (Revelation 7:13 - 14, 19: 7 - 8).