God's Covenant with Noah

The event

Fresh off the ark and standing before Noah's altar, God did something He had never done before: He made a covenant, not just with Noah but with "every living creature," and not just for Noah's lifetime but "for all future generations" — a promise that never again would a flood destroy all life on earth. He renewed to Noah the same commission He had given Adam — be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth — added a new permission to eat meat, and issued a solemn new command: because man is made in God's image, whoever sheds human blood must answer for it, the foundational text behind capital justice and the sanctity of human life throughout Scripture.

As the sign of this covenant, God set His bow in the clouds — the rainbow — visible not primarily as a reminder to humanity, but as a reminder to God Himself: "I will look upon it and remember the everlasting covenant." It is a strikingly tender image: the Creator of the universe binding Himself, by His own initiative, never again to unmake the world by flood.

This covenant with Noah is the first of the great covenants that structure the whole biblical story; the later covenants with Abraham, Moses, David, and finally the new covenant in Christ all build on the same pattern of a gracious God binding Himself to His creation. Every rainbow since has quietly testified that the God who judges sin is also, patiently and deliberately, a God who preserves and provides for the world He made.

Dating

Dated immediately after the Flood's traditional 2348-2347 BC timeframe; the covenant follows directly upon Noah's exit from the ark and altar sacrifice, and is not separately dated in the text.

Scripture references

• Genesis 9:1-17