For most of us, the first association we have with the rainbow is the story of Noah. God put a rainbow in the sky to signify his promise to never destroy the earth with a flood again.
This meaning lives on in the western consciousness: a sign of hope and a better tomorrow.
We also know of the leprechaun and his pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. This place at rainbow’s end seems impossible to reach, and this elusiveness reflects the mischievous nature of the leprechaun.
The rainbow in this depiction inspires feelings of magic and mystery.
Traveling further back, Australian Aboriginal mythology tells of the Rainbow Serpent that is the Creator God who formed the world and created humans. Rock paintings of it date as far back as 8000 to 10,000 years B.C.
Its association with water tells of its role as the giver of life, but also its destructive force, such as storms or cyclones, when angry.
As a creator deity, the Rainbow Serpent is also tied to fertility. Here we see the coming together of the snake and rainbow symbols: fertility of creation combined with divinity, and we get the synthesis of the spiritual and material worlds.
While some cultures marvel at and worship rainbows, others fear them. The Sumu of Honduras and Nicaragua believe the rainbow is a bad omen and hide their children away to keep them from looking or pointing at it. The Karens of Burma believe it is a dangerous demon that eats children.
Bridge of Heaven
In numerous mythologies, the rainbow is seen as a bridge between the visible world and the spiritual world. Psychologically, it is the path with which the transcendent brings messages to our consciousness.
The Greek goddess Iris is the personification of the rainbow and a messenger for the gods. The rainbow is her path from heaven to earth, thus forming a link between the two realms.
If we are to take the gods as personifications of forces in our subconscious minds, Iris and her rainbow may be interpreted as that which translates unconscious insights into our consciousness as divine revelations.
The Bifrost in Norse mythology is the rainbow bridge between Midgard (earth) and Asgard (home of the gods). The prophecy of Ragnarok predicts that the Bifrost will collapse under the weight of the sons of giants who come to destroy earth. The world will then be burned and submerged underwater before rising again cleansed and renewed.
One could interpret this to mean: when the connection between the numinous and the psyche is severed, chaos is imminent.
Now we get to the part that is really exciting.
This idea of the bridge between the spiritual and the physical, or the conscious and the unconscious, brings to mind the image of the cross of Christ on Calvary.
Literally suspended between heaven and earth, the figure of Christ acts as mediator for broken humanity. Christ and his cross, and the process of spiritual renewal that is represented, are the path through which we are illumined and transformed by the divine.
But that isn't all. In our previous discussion on the symbolism of the snake, we noted that Christ compared himself with the brass snake of Moses. What's really exciting about this is that we see the Cross bringing together the symbols of the rainbow and the snake—just like the Rainbow Serpent we just talked about.
Christ is like a type of Rainbow Serpent. Just as the mythological snake synthesizes the spiritual and material worlds, Christ brings together the divine and human natures. And just as the Rainbow Serpent is the creative force that made the world, Christ is the animating spirit that rebirths the human soul.
This revitalizing force is only possible when the divine and material are bridged—the truth that Christology deeply understands.
Transcendence and ultimate synthesis
Tibetan Buddhists associate the rainbow’s ethereal appearance with the spirit’s transcending of physical reality. The “rainbow body” is the level of realization that is attained by complete knowledge through intense meditation. When a person dies in this state, their body dissolves into rainbow-colored light.
The multifaceted yet unified appearance of the rainbow speaks to the state of complete integration and actualization that transcends the fractured reality of our world—a symbol of unity in diversity.
Finally, we recall Noah’s Flood again, the tale of Primordial Chaos destroying the world with a vengeance. As God stamped the sky with his bow, he indicated his power to hold the forces of Chaos at bay.
With this in mind, we flip to the other end of the Bible, to the Book of Revelation where “a rainbow that shone like an emerald encircled the throne” of God. Before the throne was a glassy sea—completely still. Later on, the apocalyptic vision describes a new world where “the sea was no more.” The message: God is sovereign over Chaos and her beasts, bringing the cosmos to perfect order.
Unity in diversity is brought about by a transcendent, unifying Principle that holds the cosmos together—what the Greeks called the Logos—like how the trunk of a tree unites the diversity of its branches together.
At the end of the day, the otherworldly arch of the rainbow--materializing, dissolving, and coming into being again--suggests the process between known and unknown, human and divine, that is our fragile bridge of expansive possibility.
Thanks again for reading! You can read the last essay in this series on archetypal symbols through the link below. The next one will be the last in this series.
I would love to hear your feedback on this new series and the newsletter!
Stay purposeful.
– Nathanael
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