II: The Flood and the Fathers

Rainbow

judgment restrained by covenant promise

Root
Gen 9:12-17 · qeshet (H7198)
Old Testament chain
  1. Gen 9:13
  2. Ezek 1:28
  3. Isa 54:9-10
  4. Rev 4:3
New Testament
Rev 4:3; Rev 10:1

After the Flood Yahuah sets His bow in the cloud as "a token of a covenant between me and the earth" (Gen 9:13). Ezekiel sees the same bow surrounding the glory on the throne (Ezek 1:28), and Isaiah turns it into an oath that Yahuah will not be wroth (Isa 54:9). In Rev 4:3 the emerald-like rainbow around the throne is a covenant sign that judgment is restrained by promise, tying the vision to the mercy that precedes every judgment. Over the mighty angel's head (Rev 10:1) it marks him as carrying the signs of the One who sent him, not as that One Himself.

From The Courtroom of Heaven, pp. 14, 66, 71, 141–142