18 th February: 1 st Sunday in Lent: Genesis 9.8–17

Genesis 9: 8–17: Two (Rain)bows, Two Covenants, and an Invitation

On the morning of March 27, 2023, I went to the university to teach a class, as usual. Afterward, I drove to the Nashville Public Library near my apartment, the Green Hills branch, arriving around 9:30 am, and began to study after laying out my things on the work table as usual. For the first forty-five minutes, everything continued as usual.

But at around 10.25 am, the library is suddenly the scene of considerable unrest. The central speaker announces there is an active shooting happening in a church just a few blocks away. The librarians lock the main entrance but allow us to leave if we wish, though they allow no one from outside to enter.

Frankly, I do not know what to do. For back home in Indonesia, having a gun is rare among civilians, as is a mass shooting. Having lived in the U.S. for a while, I have of course heard news reports of mass shootings in different parts of the country, but I’ve never been so close to one. Then I remember my spouse is alone in our apartment five minutes away from the shooting location. So I drive back to my apartment, passing numerous police cars and school buses driving by.

When I arrive home, I realize that my spouse does not even know that anything is amiss, let alone the specifics of the situation. So we turn on the television. The shooting occurred in an elementary school called ‘The Covenant School’, located in the complex of Covenant Presbyterian Church. Around 10:11 am, a person with military-style rifles and pistols entered the building and randomly shot three nine-year-old children and three staff members to death. They were: Evelyn Dieckhaus (9), William Kinney (9), Hallie Scruggs (9), Cynthia Peak (61), Mike Hill (61), and Katherine Koonce (60).

It is a horrific incident, and the nation weeps and grieves in the days that follow. Several vigils are held, and innumerable flowers, balloons, and stuffed animals are placed at the school to commemorate the lives of the victims.

A few weeks after the incident, the school held its first chapel service after the tragic event. As they entered the building, the pupils and teachers were awe-struck by the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds above. Dave Barnes, a contemporary Christian singer whose children attend the school, shared this moment on his social media account, commenting, ‘It was like God was yelling from heaven—“I see you! I have not forgotten you!” [That rainbow] was one of the most poignant things I’ve ever experienced in my life.’ ¹

Perhaps Noah and his family had a similar experience when they saw the first rainbow—the one mentioned in one of our Bible readings today. The rainbow emerges not only after the long forty days and nights of rainfall but also after one hundred and fifty days of deluge. So it was more than just simply ‘a rainbow after the rain’: it was a rainbow after the great flood! As we know from Genesis 7–8, the great flood entirely covered the earth. The text indicates that it drowned most humans and other living creatures, with only Noah and his family and some designated animals surviving the awful event.

I try to imagine how traumatic and terrifying it was for the students and staff who were in lockdown and heard gunshots echoing in the air. Perhaps a few of them saw the bodies of the victims. Similarly, I could not imagine the painful agonies of the parents and families of Evelyn, William, Hallie, Cynthia, Mike, and Katherine, upon seeing their loved ones laid down breathless. Noah likely had a similar experience when he heard the screams, if not the sights of his friends and other relatives drowning. I imagine that image or echo was still in the minds of Noah’s family as they stood on the dry land of Mount Ararat, looking at the rainbow in the sky.

Noah’s family then heard God say, ‘I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth’ (Gen 9:13). This bow was to be a visible memento of God’s covenant with the earth. God also told them—and us—‘When I bring clouds over the earth, and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh’ (vv. 14–15).

But what covenant are we talking about here? Verse 15 continues: ‘that the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh’. The covenant here highlights respect for life. Something that has been vulnerable, especially in the face of the great flood. Dalit biblical scholar, Maria Arual Raja, comments, ‘This covenant between the life-protecting God and every offspring of its mother and every living creature of all flesh on the earth further underscores the significance of the integrity of world of creation, humans and God.’ ²

This biblical passage is preceded by an expression of concern and respect for life as well. Verse 6 says, ‘Whoever sheds the blood of a human, by a human shall that person’s blood be shed, for in his own image God made humans.’ Both passages highlight respect for life. Life is precious, life is valuable, life is priceless. Any life that lost is thus worthy of being grieved for, mourned, and being reflected.

And as I reflected upon the ‘covenant’ in the passage and the incident in the Covenant School, along with the respective appearances of the rainbow, I came across an alternative take on ‘the bow’ in a passage by Dutch biblical scholar Ellen van Wolde that aptly connects the two ‘(rain)bows’ in the two ‘Covenants’ after the tragic moments of lost lives. ³ Van Wolde first points out that of 76 occurrences of the Hebrew word qěšět used to depict the ‘bow’ in the sky, 72 times it refers specifically to a warrior’s bow. This concept is corroborated with the broader ancient Near Eastern pictorial and literary materials in the relation of the ‘bow’ to warfare, power, a sign of victory, and also to the end of war. Van Wolde then interprets our Genesis passage not as specifically about the etiology of a rainbow in the sky but also as being about God’s handing over the weapon and promising ‘never again to attack and destroy all living beings on earth’. ⁴ It is a covenant about respecting life on earth.

If we are about to become imitatio dei or imitators of God, as the traditional reading of Gen 1:28 has it, perhaps we also need to imitate God by handing over, surrendering, and dropping our weapons to respect life more fully. To drop our weapon so that there will not be another Evelyn, William, Hallie, or the more than 25,000 people killed by gun violence in the U.S. between January and August 2023 alone. ⁵ To drop our weapons beyond the U.S. context so that there will not be a repeat of the 870,000 children that have been killed due to armed conflict between 2013 and 2017 alone. ⁶ Perhaps this is an invitation from both the rainbow in the Covenant school and the (rain)bow in the Covenant of Genesis 9—to hand over our weapons and to respect life.

Acknowledgement: The sermon was written during the research visit at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Summer of 2023. I thank Seth A. Bledsoe and Carly L. Crouch for providing the research space.