Somewhere Over the Rainbow

Pride Shabbat

June 20, 2025

Friday, June 26, 2015. The Supreme Court issued their decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, granting same-sex couples the right to marry in all 50 states. I remember that Shabbat was especially joyful. So many of us felt that the arc of the moral universe was finally bending toward justice, and that the arc was, in fact a rainbow.

Friday, June 20, 2025. This week, the Supreme Court upheld Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors, putting the lives and well-being of transgender kids at risk. This follows a series of anti-LGBTQ actions since President Trump’s inauguration, including cutting funding for programs that support the LGBTQ community, removing references to LGBTQ people and issues from government websites and national parks, and rolling back protections for LGBTQ people, particularly transgender and non-binary people. Across the country, transgender people cannot access health care, safely use public bathrooms, compete in school sports, or have IDs that accurately identify them. 

Many of us are afraid of what the future holds. We are afraid, but we are not hopeless, and we are not helpless. We look to our communities, to our leaders, to our history, and to our tradition and we find sources for strength and hope and faith. For one thing, we find rainbows.

In case it’s been a while since you read the story of Noah in the book of Genesis, I’ll refresh your memory. After God sends a flood to wipe out all life on earth, except for Noah, his family, and some very lucky pairs of animals, the waters recede and dry land appears. God commands Noah and his family to leave the ark and begin life anew. But this time, God makes a promise. God says, “I now establish My covenant with you and your offspring to come, and with every living thing that is with you—birds, cattle, and every wild beast as well—all that have come out of the ark, every living thing on earth. … [N]ever again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth…. I have set My bow in the clouds, and it shall serve as a sign of the covenant between Me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth, and the bow appears in the clouds, I will remember My covenant …so that the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh” (Gen. 9:9-15). The rainbow is a strange and contradictory symbol. One one hand, it is a reminder of the fallibility of humanity. In fact, the Talmud teaches that the rainbow only appears during generations that don’t have any perfectly righteous people in them (Ket. 77a). As God says after the flood, “Never again will I doom the earth because of humankind, since the devisings of the human mind are evil from youth” (Gen. 8:21). In other words, God has learned not to despair over human beings’ wickedness, but to accept it. So on the other hand, the rainbow is a sign of God’s grace, a promise to keep faith with us in spite of our flaws.  The rainbow, which only appears when it’s cloudy, is a symbol of hope and faith particularly during dark times. 

The rainbow flag became a symbol for the LGBTQ community during another troubled time, as gay and lesbian people were fighting for acceptance and equality in this country. The original rainbow flag was created by Gilbert Baker, a gay activist and drag queen in San Francisco who was known for his “sewing skills and flamboyant creations.” In 1978, Harvey Milk challenged Baker to create a new symbol for the LGBTQ community. Here’s what Baker said about it:

“… I thought of the American flag with its thirteen stripes and thirteen stars, the colonies breaking away from England to form the United States. I thought of the vertical red, white, and blue tricolor from the French Revolution and how both flags owed their beginnings to a riot, a rebellion, or revolution. I thought a gay nation should have a flag too, to proclaim its own idea of power. As a community, both local and international, gay people were in the midst of an upheaval, a battle for equal rights, a shift in status where we were now demanding power, taking it. This was our new revolution: a tribal, individualistic, and collective vision. It deserved a new symbol.”  

Later, Baker was at a dance club, watching people of different genders, backgrounds, and colors move to the music. He writes, “Dance fused us, magical and cleansing. We were all in a swirl of color and light. It was like a rainbow. A rainbow. That’s the moment when I knew exactly what kind of flag I would make.” The first rainbow flag was flown at San Francisco’s Gay Freedom Day Parade on June 25, 1978 and has since become a powerful symbol for LGBTQ identity and pride.

The Transgender Pride Flag was created in 1999 by Monica Helms, a transgender activist, author, and Navy veteran. She explains the design this way, “The stripes at the top and bottom are light blue, the traditional color for baby boys. The stripes next to them are pink, the traditional color for baby girls. The stripe in the middle is white, for those who are intersex, transitioning or consider themselves having a neutral or undefined gender. The pattern is such that no matter which way you fly it, it is always correct, signifying us finding correctness in our lives.” Today, we also see flags that combine both the rainbow and the transgender stripes, celebrating all of the members of the LGBTQ community.

Jewish tradition teaches that when we see a rainbow, we are supposed to recite a blessing. Here it is: 

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם, זוֹכֵר הַבְּרִית וְנֶאֱמָן בְּרִיתוֹ וְקַיָּם בַּמַאֲמָרוֹ Blessed are You, Eternal our God, Ruler of the universe, who remembers the covenant and is true to Their covenant, and keeps Their word.

When we see a rainbow, we bless God and thank God for keeping faith with humanity, in spite of our many failings. Whatever storm we are weathering, the rainbow reassures us that it’s not, in fact, the end of the world, even though it may feel that way. When we see a rainbow flag, we might offer another prayer, affirming our own brit, our own promise: that we will never stop fighting for the rights and well-being of LGBTQ people. We will stand up, together, against assaults on equality and freedom. We will continue to have faith – and we will put that faith into action – that unjust laws can be overturned and just laws can be enacted. No matter how long that arc of the moral universe is, we will keep on bending it toward justice.