The subject tonight, as we just heard, is the rainbow. I brought myself some sefarim to quote, maybe to quote, in the Chumash, and I could start anything else. Okay. And as you all know and understand, and as I mentioned many times, I am not an expert in any astronomy or any scientific inyanim things, so when I talk about any subject, it's only from the Torah perspective, what the Torah has to say about it, not to discuss anything else. So, tonight too, when we talk about the rainbow, it's going to be about what we find in the Torah concerning the rainbow. So, I'm not going to discuss the rainbow colors or things like that, but what the Torah has to say about the rainbow. Now, we know that the rainbow came, started, as we learn in Chumash, after the mabul, after the flood. After the flood, after Hashem destroyed the whole world, and there was nothing left but Noach and his family and the animals that were in the ark, and when after the year of the mabul, when they came out of the teivah, Hashem, God promised that He will never, ever bring a mabul again. And God said like this, and I'm quoting from Parashat Noach, I'll read it in the English, so I won't have to spend time translating it. And God said to Noach and to his sons with him, saying, \"And as for me, behold, I establish my covenant with you and with your offspring after you, and with every living being that is with you, with the birds, with the animals, and with every beast of the land with you, all that departed from the ark, every beast of the land. I will confirm my covenant with you, never again shall all flesh be cut off by waters of the flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.\" And God said, \"This is a sign of the covenant that I give between me and you, and every living being that is with you, to generations forever: I have set my rainbow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. And it shall happen, when I place a cloud over the earth, and the bow will be seen in the cloud, I will remember my covenant between me and you and every living being among all flesh, and the water shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. And the bow shall be in the cloud, and I will look upon it, to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living being amongst all flesh that is on the earth.\" And God said to Noach, \"This is the sign of the covenant that I have confirmed between me and all flesh that is upon the earth.\" So, here we see clearly that the rainbow came after the flood. Hashem wanted to make a siman, a sign, that He will never, ever again bring a flood and destroy the earth, so the siman, the sign is the rainbow. And therefore, it says that every time we see a rainbow, what it really means, and so it seems, the simple peshat, we'll get into it a little bit deeper later, that every time we see a rainbow, it's as if Hashem is saying that really, I should have brought a flood, but the reason I am not bringing a flood is because I promised. And that is the idea of the rainbow that is the sign of Hashem's covenant, of Hashem's promise never to bring a flood. That's why it's a custom by Yidden that when you happen to be walking, let's say, and you see a rainbow, and your friend that's with you did not see it, don't show it to him. Because if he didn't see it, then obviously the sign is not for him, but if you show it to him, it's as if you're pushing it up on him, so don't show it. If he sees it, he sees it. Even though there is a berachah that one is to make when you see a rainbow, and sometimes you would like to be mezakeh, to give him the merit, the zechut of being able to make a berachah, especially it's a kind of berachah that's not so common. You see, a ברכה המוציא לחם מן הארץ we make very often, and a ברכה בורא מיני מזונות we make often, or שהכל נהיה בדברו, this is a berachah that we don't make too often. So, it would make sense to show the person the rainbow, make him aware of it, and therefore he would make a berachah. Nevertheless, it says better not to because if he didn't see it, obviously it's not for him, because as good as it is, it has some kind of bad connotation, it has a bad siman showing that Hashem really would want to bring a mabul. And that's why also it says in the Midrash, and Rashi brings it down, and there are different expressions in different places that the rabbis, our sages say, but the point is that there were certain generations that there was no rainbow. For instance, it says in the time of Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi, was a great tzaddik, in his generation there was no rainbow. And what it means is, in simple peshat, that he was such a great tzaddik that in his zechut, because of his merit, the world didn't deserve a mabul to begin with. The whole idea is that Hashem is showing that even though you deserve a mabul, I'm not bringing the death, the flood, because of the because of my promise, which is expressed in the rainbow. But when the great צדיק, Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi, lived, the world did not deserve a rainbow. Also mainly we find by the other two, Yehoshua ben Levi is not is an opinion, but we find that in the generation of Chizkiyahu HaMelech, Chizkiyahu the king, so it says in that time there was no rainbow, because his generation was a very great generation. It says that even children knew halachot. Even children were very careful with the most complicated halachot. It says they made a search and they saw from Be'er Sheva to Dan, which is throughout the whole of Eretz Yisrael, even children were very well versed in the halachot of tumah vetaharah, purity and impurity, which are very complicated halachot. Then we also find in the time of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, the great צדיק, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, the Tanna, who was the author of the Zohar, in his generation there was no rainbow, for the same reason, because of his zechut, the world did not deserve a flood. But this is all to show that the rainbow came as a result of the flood, because Hashem promised never to bring a flood, that He made the sign, the rainbow.

Now, commentaries, many mefarshim, ask a very obvious question: how can we say that the rainbow started only after the flood, when the rainbow really comes naturally, which has nothing to do with anything anything spiritual? We know that the rainbow comes when the rays of the sun reflect off the clouds. This causes a rainbow. Now, in that case, this is something that's there in the nature of the world. So how can we say that the rainbow came as a result of Hashem's promise never to bring the flood again? As if saying, before that there was no rainbow. But the nature basically did not change. Hashem did not make a new, renewed natural laws within the world. And therefore, if it's only natural that when the sun reflects against the clouds it forms into a rainbow, then how can we say that this started only after the flood, when really this was probably there before, too? Because this is only natural. And the commentaries answer that true, it's natural, but nevertheless, only when the clouds are very fine and eydl, very thin, that's when, when the rays of the sun bounce off the clouds, it forms into a rainbow. But if the clouds would be very, very thick, if the the the the humidity, so to speak, in the atmosphere is very, very thick, like a thick cloud, this would not form a rainbow. It's only when it's dakotdik. I'm just quoting what the mefarshim say, I assume this is understood also naturally, I'm not I'm not saying it from any sources, any scientific sources, I'm just saying it from the sources of the mefarshim on the Chumash. They say that when the cloud the clouds are very thick, then the rays of the sun will not form a rainbow. It's only when it's eydl and fine and thin, that's when it comes the the rays of the sun come through. The rays of the sun don't have any color, but when it bounces off or goes through, it bounces off from the clouds which have this eydlikayt, and it's fine, that's when it'll form into those colors of the rainbow. And therefore, they say, before the mabul, the clouds were very, very thick, the clouds were very, very coarse. It's only after the mabul, after the flood, that the world was refined, and therefore the clouds became much finer, and therefore, only then did the bounce did the rays of the sun that bounce off the clouds turn into a rainbow. So it is true that this is a natural natural happening. And nevertheless it didn't happen before, not because the nature changed, the physical part of the world changed. And therefore before, when the clouds were thick, because the whole world was more coarse before the mabul, and therefore the clouds were also more thick, the atmosphere was more thick. And the moisture in the air was more thick, and therefore the clouds the rays of the sun did not cause a rainbow. But after the flood, that's when the rainbow started. So it fits to what it says in Chumash, even naturally, that there only came after the flood, even though it's a natural thing, because that nature itself is only possible when the clouds are in a fine level, are fine and eydl, and therefore it's possible to happen only then.

The question is only, as we understand superficially, what the flood did, it rinsed the world of its dirt. It says in Chumash that the people were very bad, ותשחת הארץ, the people became very immoral, and even the animals were immoral. So Hashem decided he's going to erase everything, he's going to destroy the whole world. And what the flood did, seemingly, is it took away the evil that was connected to the world through the behavior of the human beings. And what the flood did, it brought the world back to the way it was before, before the world had its descent in the spiritual level. Now in that case, why would there be a change in the nature of the world as far as the clouds are concerned after the flood? See, all the flood did, it brought the world back to the way it was before. If there was no rainbow before, from the beginning of creation, there was never a rainbow till after the flood, even before the human being the people became bad, and the reason is because before the clouds were very thick. So why was it that the world changed after the flood, that the clouds became much finer and now there is a possibility of a rainbow? So what we must say is that what the flood accomplished was not only that the world came back to the stage, the level the way it was before the people ruined the world, but it brought the world to a level even higher than it was before the original creation, at the time of original creation, before the people became bad, even higher than that. And the truth is we see it in the fact that the mabul, it says the flood, was like a mikveh. Just like when a person becomes tamei, impure, and he goes to the mikveh and the mikveh cleanses the person spiritually, the mabul was also a mikveh cleansing for the world. That's why just like a mikveh, there is a certain minimum amount of water that a mikveh must have, and that is arba'im se'ah, forty se'ah. Se'ah is a certain measurement of water in the Gemara's time, forty such measurements the water of the mikvah has to have. The mabul, the flood, lasted for forty days, because the mabul was like a mikvah for the whole world. Now, in mikvah, we find two concepts. And once I think we spoke about the mabul, I explained it. We find two concepts in mikvah. One thing is that mikvah takes away tumah, impurity, spiritual impurity that could come upon a person. When you go to the mikvah, it takes away, it cleans the person. But that's only one step of mikvah. This step doesn't add anything to the person, all it does is it takes away any impurity. And then what happens to the person? He comes back to the stage as he was before. But there is another aspect to mikvah. Mikvah adds tosefet kedushah. It adds more kedushah to a person even if he wasn't tamei. That's why that it's good for a person to go to the mikvah, and basically we're talking about men, women mikvah is a different story, that they have to go על פי הלכה, talking about mikvah for men is good even if a person is not tamei, because just going to the mikvah adds kedushah to the person, and then he will become holier than he was before. And the best proof, I think the Shelah, Shnei Luchot HaBrit, Shelah writes, brings proof from the mikvah that the kohen gadol used to go on Yom Kippur. We know on Yom Kippur when the kohen gadol, the high priest, would do the service in the Beit HaMikdash, it was the only day of the year that only the kohen gadol was allowed to do the service. So when the kohen gadol did the service, he would have to wash his hands and feet from the kiyor ten times during the service, and five times he would have to go to the mikvah. Now you could say the first time that he went to the mikvah was maybe he was tamei, he was impure and didn't realize it, so to be sure, he went to the mikvah to get rid of the tumah. But after he did that once, what was the purpose of going to the mikvah a second time? And then a third time, and a fourth time, and a fifth time? What did he gain? If mikvah would only be to take away impurity, then once you go, then you're rid of your tumah, and that's it! Why is there a mitzvah, on him there was an obligation to go a second time, up to five times? The answer is because mikvah also brings tosefet kedushah, it adds kedushah, holiness, to the person, even more than he was before. And that's why, and I mention this always, that the Baal Shem Tov said that it's very important for a man to go to the mikvah, and as the custom is, we go to the mikvah on Friday, we go to the מקוה שבת morning, and even in the middle of the week, if you're able to go, we go to the mikveh. And the reason is because this adds tosefet kedushah. It says in Chassidut that this is one of the preparations to davenen. Before a person davens, there are three things which are good as a preparation that the davenen should be proper: to give tzedakah, charity, before davenen, to learn a few words of Chassidut, which are the insights in Torah, so that gives puts you into a mood of spirituality to daven properly, and then to go to the mikveh, because that brings a person to a higher level of kedushah. And the Baal Shem Tov said, I'll repeat this although even though I've said it many times, that there are two things: one, which is not an aveirah, but it could lead a person to the worst aveirot. And then there's another thing, which is not a mitzvah, but it could lead the person to the greatest mitzvot. The thing which is not an aveirah which could lead to aveirot is atzvut, sadness, depression. A person should always be b'simchah, always be happy. If a person is sad, there's no aveirah, it doesn't say anywhere it is forbidden to be sad, there's no such official aveirah, but if a person is sad and depressed, it could lead him to do the worst aveirot. Because you give up hope, and then you don't care, then you do anything. And then he said there's one thing which is not a mitzvah, no official mitzvah, but it could lead you to the greatest mitzvot, and that is going to the mikveh. And I'm not talking about women who have to go על פי דין, but we're talking about mikveh for men, where there is no obligation על פי הלכה, according to the din, to go. He said nevertheless, if a person goes to the mikveh, it could purify him, bring holiness into the person, that it will lead him to do many mitzvot, because if you're holier, you get this feeling to mitzvot. So, mikveh has this quality of bringing kedushah. The mikveh that the mabul was was the same. It had the quality of cleansing the world of its tumah, got rid of all impurity that was connected to the world, so to speak. And from that point of view, the world came back to the way it was before. But in truth, the mabul accomplished more than that. The mabul brought the world to a higher level, even higher than it was originally, like the mikveh brings a person to a higher level than was before. And therefore, originally, the world, since it was in a lower level, it was more coarse, spiritually more coarse and physically more coarse. After the mabul, the world that was cleansed and went through the purification of the mikveh, the world reached a higher level and became finer spiritually and physically. And I'll give an example where we see it. We know one thing that changed from before the flood to after the flood: before the flood, Hashem told Adam HaRishon, Adam, that he's not allowed to, he and no human being is allowed to eat meat. The truth is there are difference of different opinions whether he wasn't allowed to eat meat at all, or he wasn't allowed to kill to eat, but if an animal died by itself, he was allowed, but generally the point is he wasn't allowed to eat meat. Right after the מבול, right after the flood, the Chumash says Hashem gave permission to eat meat. Now, what change took place? Now, they say that before the מבול the fruit had much more vitamins, and it was much stronger and didn't need the meat. Fine, but we're talking here about a prohibition. Hashem didn't allow them to eat meat, not that it was necessary. He said, \"You shouldn't eat meat. You can't, you're not allowed to eat meat.\" And after the flood, Hashem allowed them. What changed? So, the answer is given in Chassidus that when a person eats food, the purpose is to elevate the food to a higher level. It's not only the food that we're elevating; since everything in the world has Godliness in it, or as it's called in Kabbalah, Godly sparks, by eating food or doing anything good with anything in the world, we elevate the sparks back to its source, not to get into the details. So, when we eat food we elevate the food. The holy sparks or the godliness that's found in meat is much harder to elevate than the sparks that are found in other types of food. Just like physically, and the truth is everything that's there in the physical part of the world is really a mirror image of the way it's in the spiritual part, physically it is much harder to digest meat, harder than fish, harder than fruit. Which is what the Rambam says in halacha, that when a person sits down to eat and he plans to have two courses, meat and fish, the Rambam says you have to eat the fish first. And the reason the Rambam gives is because it's harder for the stomach to digest the meat, so therefore eat first the fish, so then the digesting system starts, but it doesn't have to work hard, and then it gets into the mood, then already you can eat the meat and the digestive system will work. Now everything that the Rambam says in halacha, even though it's because of a physical reason, has a spiritual interpretation. The spiritual reason is the same, because to elevate the holy sparks that are found in fish is easier than that's found in meat. And therefore you've got to get first into the mood of the digesting the spiritual digesting system. The elevation of the sparks is also a digesting system. You digest it spiritually and you just like when you your stomach digest does the food digests the food, the waste the bad part falls out and the good part becomes your life, so too spiritually. You take the holy sparks out and the rest of it goes down. So it's a digesting system. So what the Rambam means is it's easier to spiritually digest to elevate fish than meat, and therefore you should first eat the fish and then eat the meat. That's why it says in the גמרא, עם הארץ אסור לאכול בשר. An am ha'aretz, a person who is not a scholar, and basically an am ha'aretz in the Gemara's time is not really a person who can't learn, he's a person who's not really 100% observant. The amei ha'aretz of the Gemara's time were not really observant. So the Gemara says an am ha'aretz should not eat meat. עם הארץ אסור לאכול בשר, it's forbidden to eat meat. Now why can't he eat meat? We're not talking about not kasher meat, we're talking about kasher meat. What it means is that a person who is not in a higher level should not eat meat because he can't really spiritually digest, elevate the meat. And that's the difference that took place before the flood and after the flood. Before the flood, being that the world was in a lower level, the people did not have that power of elevating the meat. And therefore Hashem said: Don't eat meat. But after the flood, being that the world was clean and not only clean, but as we said before, the world was changed and became was elevated to a higher level. Now there was an ability in the people of the world to elevate even meat, so Hashem said: Now you're allowed to eat meat. So we see here that the world was actually elevated more than before. And the same is concerning the clouds, that before the flood, the clouds were more coarse, because spiritually the world was more coarse, so the clouds were more coarse. And therefore there was no rainbow, because when the rays of the sun shined on the clouds, it couldn't form a rainbow because it was too coarse, it was thick. Imagine the sun shines on the wall, it doesn't cause a rainbow. It's only the clouds when they are in such a fine the atmosphere is so eidel and fine, that's when it makes it into a rainbow. But after the flood, and the world was elevated spiritually, so the clouds physically also became eidel-er and finer and thinner, and therefore there was a rainbow.

Now to be more specific exactly what took place, what kind of change took place before and after, we see an interesting thing. We see in the change that took place from the before the flood and after the flood, we see a contradiction. On one hand, we see that the world became stronger. What do I mean became stronger? The world, the universe, the way it was from the beginning of the creation till the flood was really very weak. What I mean weak is there was a possibility for it to be destroyed. The best proof for the possibility is that it actually happened, the world was destroyed. But after the flood, there was a promise of Hashem that He'll never destroy the world, so now it says in sefarim the world became stronger. Now there is no potential possibility of the world ever being destroyed. We look in Chumash, Hashem said from now on let everything come back to its place, לא ישבותו, they never should cease to work, they should never stop. So the world became stronger, more tokef we call it in Hebrew, more strength. On the other hand, As the Ramban points out, before the מבול, he said, people lived much longer. After the מבול, the age of the people became much shorter. So we see that the world became weaker to a certain degree. Before, they were stronger, now the world is weaker. People don't live as long, so people are not as strong. Why is it? Is this a contradiction? And the answer is, and again I'm going to bring it the way it's said in Chassidus, so we're looking at from a more spiritual point of view. The difference between before the מבול, at least from the beginning of creation till the מבול, and what took place after the מבול was, that the existence of the world, the way it was from the beginning of creation, was an existence that came because of Hashem's side. Hashem, who is the creator, made the world, and since He made the world, He gave the world its existence, its being, its strength. But there was no strength of existence in the world from the world's side. We have a concept of milma'alah lematah and milmat ah lema'alah. Milma'alah lematah means from above to below. Milmatta lemala means from below to above. Hashem from His side gave into the world a certain strength. So it's all because of Him. But as far as the world on its own is concerned, there's no real strength in the world. The world in itself doesn't really have a complete existence. After the מבול, what Hashem did, He said that now the world from its side will have an existence. And that's why there can't be any destruction of the whole world anymore. The reason is very simple, because if the whole existence came only from Hashem's side, so as long as the people are close to Hashem, the world has its existence. The moment the people are getting further away and further away, so that existence gets weaker and weaker, so finally it came to a point where there can't be any existence, Hashem makes the flood. But later what Hashem did was He made the existence of the world in such a way now that the world will exist, the strength of its existence will come from within the world itself. And therefore makes no difference whether the world is closer to God or not, the world has that strength. And that's why before the מבול, the world was weaker because on its own it was weaker, and the מבול, there was a potential possibility of destruction, while later not. On the other hand, because the existence and the strength before the flood came from Hashem, therefore people lived very long, because the existence that comes from God's side is very, very strong, so people lived long. Now that the existence is there from the universe, from the creation's side, so that's weaker, so people don't live so long. So on one hand, weaker because it comes milmatta lemala, but on the other hand, it's stronger because now on its own it has that ability. But anyway, getting back to the point, being that the world has that existence Hashem put in, so the world got this idea that from the world's side itself, from the earth's being, it's a strong being. The idea of clouds, where do clouds come from? Or where does moisture come from? So we find a pasuk in Chumash where it says, \"ואד יעלה מן הארץ\", that the moisture comes from the bottom, from the earth, and goes up, and that turns into rain. Whenever we talk about rain and טל, טל ומטר, dew and rain, so we always say that dew comes from above, and rain comes from below. That's what it says in Gemara, it's in Chassidus. Now, we know rain comes from the sky, but what makes the water, what brings the rain there, it comes from below. Since there is moisture down here, the moisture gets picked up, and that turns into rain, and that turns into the clouds, and that turns into the rain. So since we just explained, according to Chassidus, not in simple peshat, that after the מבול what happened was that the world, Hashem put into the world an existence from the world's point of view, from the world's angle, so things that come from below, from the world's side, became stronger, became better. And therefore the clouds became better clouds, they have a better existence. So the clouds became better, finer, and therefore, only after the flood was there possibility for a קשת, a possibility for a rainbow. So basically, the question that was asked, how can we say that it was only after the flood that we have the rainbow and really this is something that's natural? The truth is it's natural, but the circumstances of the way it was before the flood, there couldn't have been a rainbow because there was nothing to reflect the rays of the sun to make a rainbow. But after Hashem said he will never bring a מבול again, and what was the sign for never bringing a מבול again was the rainbow. Now when you say he'll never bring a מבול again, what it means is, looking at it from the spiritual point of view, it means Hashem said now the world has no more potential of destruction. That means he put this eternity, so to speak, eternal strength into the world as the world below is, not only from above, from Hashem. So things which represent the below became better, became stronger, and therefore the clouds became finer, and now there cannot be anymore, and now there could be a קשת, and now there could be a, a rainbow. And this explains, by the way, why is it that Hashem made the rainbow as a sign. Hashem wanted the, the simple peshat, God made a promise, a covenant, he will never bring a flood again. And he wanted to make a sign. Why did he pick a rainbow? Now in truth, it's hard to ask such a question because anything he would do we'd ask, why did he do that, so he picked something. But that's not true, everything has to have an explanation. So why did he pick a rainbow? What does a rainbow have to do with not bringing a flood again? Okay, the thinking is a rainbow comes after rain, so it reminds us of rain, and rain is a flood, but really there must be more to it. But the way Chassidus explains, it's understood, because the rainbow shows that the clouds are finer and are able to reflect the sun, which they were not able to do before the rainbow. So it's not only that Hashem picked the rainbow as a sign for his promise, his promise, automatically, on its own, turned into a rainbow, because his promise meant that now the world is finer, is better, that itself changed into a rainbow.

But so far we've been talking about the rainbow as a sign, as an automatic sign let's say, but as a sign that Hashem will not bring the מבול, which always reminds us that Hashem is ready to bring a מבול, but he promised he won't bring it, so he doesn't bring it. So the rainbow is actually not a good sign. It's a sign of goodness, but it comes as a result of something that's not good. So whenever we see the rainbow, it's a reminder of the מבול. And as I said at the beginning, that's why the custom is don't show somebody a rainbow if he didn't see it. Why push him into seeing it when he didn't see it? Maybe to him it's not a sign, maybe he's not one of those people that deserve a מבול. So the rainbow is really a sign which reminds us of something bad. But the truth is that we do find a rainbow to mean the opposite. The first place that we find it is in the מעשה מרכבה. The מעשה מרכבה is called the chariot that the Navi, the prophet Yechezkel saw. The source of everything that we have in Kabbalah, in the secrets of the Torah, is all based on those two chapters in Yechezkel, which is called the מרכבה. In the מרכבה, Yechezkel described his vision that he saw all the different things that are going on in heaven. Usually in Chumash, or in the prophets, or in the כתובים, in the written Torah we learn very little about what goes on in heaven. We speak about, it's mentioned Hashem spoke to Moshe, but it doesn't tell us anything that goes on up there in the higher world, only talks about what takes place in this world. Here in Yechezkel it talks about what takes, takes place in the higher world. The angels are flying around, and this is happening, and God is sitting on his chair, and all kinds of things. And one of the things it mentions there is that when it speaks about the rays of God, it says, it's כמראה הקשת אשר יהיה בענן, like the rainbow that's in the cloud, כן מראה, that's the sight of מראה דמות כבוד השם. This is the מראה, the sign of the glory of God. So there he says that the rainbow represents the glory of God. We find in a מדרש, it says, why is a rainbow called a קשת? In Hebrew, a rainbow is called a קשת. The word קשת comes from the word מוקשה. מוקשה means compared. And it says the reason is because it's דבר המוקשה לי. Hashem says this is called a קשת because it's compared to me. It reminds everybody of me. So the rainbow is supposed to remind us of Hashem. And that's the reason it says a din, an interesting din. There are certain things אסור להסתכל, you're not allowed to look at. You're not allowed to, not stam just to give a look, but you can't, like, how would you say, look when you look very hard? Stare! Stare. So it says you can't stare at a קשת, you're not allowed to. You're not allowed to stare at the rainbow. And the reason is it says because the rainbow is called קשת, דבר המוקשה לי, something is compared to me, and it's called a זלזול, a being light in the כבוד of Hashem if you stare at a rainbow. Imagine you would stare somebody in his face. Very not nice, not manners to stare somebody straight in his face. And the same is to stare God in His face, it's not nice. It's against the כבוד of the person you're staring at. So it says, you're not allowed to stare, אסור להסתכל בקשת, because if you stare at the rainbow it's remind, it's as if you're staring at God. So here we see that a rainbow is something special. A rainbow is not a sign of wickedness, so to speak, that we are wicked. Then we find another place. There's a story in the Gemara Chagigah it says that Rabbi Elazar ben Arach, a great תנא, Rabbi Elazar ben Arach, once asked permission of his teacher, of his Rebbe, Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai, if he could repeat a certain dvar Torah, a certain word of Torah that he had taught him in the מעשה מרכבה, in the part of Yechezkel of מעשה מרכבה. He gave him permission and it says that Rabbi Elazar ben Arach got up and he spoke, and he repeated a kabbalistic idea, and after he finished ירדה אש מן השמים. It was so holy it actually brought down a fire from heaven that surrounded them. Then the Gemara continues that when the great תנא, Rabbi Yosi Hakohen and the other תנא, Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel heard about it, so it says like this, אף הם פתחו במעשה מרכבה, and he decided they're also going to talk about מעשה מרכבה, they're also going to talk Kabbalah, they're also going to talk about the secrets of the Torah. And they spoke all kinds of ענינים in Kabbalah. אמרו, I'm quoting the Gemara, Gemara Chagigah in Yerushalmi, אמרו, it was said, יום אחד בתקופת תמוז היה, when they did this, it was a day in the month of Tamuz. Now we know, in the month of Tamuz, which is the middle of the summer in Eretz Yisrael, it does not rain. It's almost impossible for it to rain. But nevertheless, after they spoke the words of Torah in Kabbalah, in מעשה מרכבה, so רעשה הארץ, the whole world, the whole earth shook, ונראתה הקשת בענן. And as a sign of their greatness, they saw, the world saw, a rainbow in the clouds. And this was a sign of their great teaching that they taught, the most deep ענינים in in מעשה מרכבה. So here too we see that this that קשת, the rainbow, is a sign of great holiness. Now there are some מפרשים on the Yerushalmi, some commentaries on Yerushalmi that say that what it means is that being that they spoke such holy words, Hashem showed that their זכות is so strong that it's enough to avoid a מבול. And in order to show that, He showed a קשת, He showed a rainbow which also has the same sign. But other מפרשים don't accept it, and they say, no, the reason why their דברי תורה, their words of Torah brought about a קשת, because it was so holy that it brought about a קשת like it says in the מעשה מרכבה, just like we learn in the מעשה מרכבה itself, in the vision of Yechezkel, it says that Godliness looked like a קשת, so too they brought about the קשת. So here we see that the rainbow is not necessarily always a sign of the world being deserving of מבול or not. And the difference it comes out is that if it's on a cloudy day, a day that normally there should be clouds or there could be clouds, and you see a rainbow, that rainbow is a sign that really there should be a מבול and Hashem promised not to bring it, He won't bring it. But if it's in a time like the story here, it was in the month of Tamuz, where really there naturally should not be clouds and should not be a rainbow, if that happens, then it shows on a very, very high spiritual level. It says in Kabbalah that clouds represent dinim. Dinim are you have chesed and din. Chesed is kindness, din is strictness. And there are certain times when Hashem behaves with the people more with din. Sometimes He behaves with them more with chesed, with kindness, sometimes He behaves more with gevurah, with din. And there are certain things that are signs that we could see that Hashem is now at a time of din. It says in Gemara that sometimes Hashem is in anger. Now we always think of it as a physical thing like a person is angry, it's all in a spiritual way, but nevertheless we have to use physical terms, there's no other way we can relate to it. So there is a time when God is angry. And just like physically you have to stay away, stay out of the way of a person who is in anger, because every little move you never know what'll happen, same thing with Hashem. When Hashem is angry, then you have to be careful, or you have to behave much better. Just use an example, the Gemara says that there is no mitzvah, no not no mitzvah, no chovah, no obligation that a person must wear tzitzit. The din is that if you happen to wear a garment with four corners, you must have tzitzit. But if you don't wear a garment with four corners, you don't have to wear tzitzit. Nevertheless, it says it's a good idea for people to get a garment with four corners and put it on in order to fulfill the mitzvah. In other words, it's not a chovah, which is an obligation, but it's a mitzvah. But the Gemara says you should know that even though a person is not punished for not wearing tzitzit, because he will be punished if he will wear four corners without tzitzit, but if you don't wear at all, then you're not going to, you won't be punished. But the Gemara says, be'idna derit'cha, if Hashem is angry anyway, they'll punish you for that too, because you should wear tzitzit. And that's why our custom is that everyone wears tzitzit. Not that we if we happen to have four corners we make sure to have tzitzit, we put on a special garment with four corners with tzitzit, because Hashem says if He's angry, He'll punish you for that too. What does that show? That when Hashem is angry, there is din, then you have to be extra careful. It says in Kabbalah that a cloud, when there are clouds, it represents dinim. And therefore, when there is a rainbow normally, rainbow which is a reflection of the clouds, it shows that this is a time of dinim. Hashem is angry, which fits with the idea that Hashem is showing us that yes, He's ready to bring a mabul, He just won't do it because He promised not to do it. But otherwise, there is anger here. But that's only if at the time, if the rainbow comes from natural clouds. But if it doesn't come from natural clouds, like in the story of Rav Elazar ben Arach or Rav Shimon ben Chalafta here, in that case, if there is a rainbow, then the rainbow is a very, very high level, it reminds us of the deepest concepts said in the nevuah of Yechezkel, the deepest concepts of Kabbalah. So we have these two types of rainbows. So whenever we think of a rainbow, and we're discussing a rainbow, this is what we have to keep in mind: Generally speaking, a rainbow is a reminder of the mabul. On the other hand, there is a concept in rainbow which is a reminder of the glory of Hashem, which is in the nevuah of Yechezkel. Now it's hard for us to know when we see a rainbow nowadays in our area, see other places where they know for sure a certain time it doesn't rain, in Eretz Yisrael, if they would see a rainbow in Tammuz, that would be a very good sign. If they see a rainbow in the middle of the winter, then not a good sign. But here it's hard to know because always possible to rain, there's no such thing as a season that can't rain. But nevertheless, it's possible that sometimes when you see a rainbow, it doesn't necessarily mean that it's a sign of a mabul, it could be that it's a good sign. And therefore, even though on one hand we find that in the time of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai there was no rainbow, but at the same time we find it in Rabbi Shimon ben Chalafta who was in a certain degree the same level as Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, and they actually had the same name, both called Rabbi Shimon, their Torah caused a rainbow, because this was a rainbow that was supposed to be a good sign. Now, what we want, what we ask Hashem is that everything that He does should be only for the good. It's always for the good, but when we say for the good we mean the good that we should see, that if we ever see a rainbow, we pray and say that this rainbow is hopefully a rainbow that shows that there is a revelation of the מעשה מרכבה, which is a rainbow. And automatically that has a connection to Mashiach. Because when Mashiach will come, there will be this great revelation of the inner parts of Torah, the מעשה מרכבה that's in Heaven, that Yechezkel saw, we will all see then when Mashiach will come. So if a rainbow comes as a sign of the מעשה מרכבה, this is a beginning of the revelation of Mashiach. And we see a special connection that says that in the two generations there was no rainbow, meaning the rainbow which is a bad sign, the time of, the two main times, Chizkiyahu HaMelech, and the time of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, and they're both connected to Mashiach. Chizkiyahu HaMelech, the Gemara says, רצה הקדוש ברוך הוא לעשות חזקיה משיח, השם wanted to make חזקיה משיח. Chizkiyahu HaMelech was so holy, Hashem wanted him to be Mashiach. There was a reason why He didn't make him Mashiach. So Chizkiyahu HaMelech had a connection to Mashiach. That's why the rainbow, which represents the bad part, wasn't shown. Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai is certainly connected to Mashiach, because he wrote the Zohar, and in the Zohar it says that Mashiach said that with this ספר of the Zohar we're going to go out to greet Mashiach. It's the beginning of the revelation, the secrets of the Torah, which is the beginning of the revelation of Mashiach. And therefore, in those two generations there was no rainbow bow which represents a bad sign, but probably there was rainbows that represented the מעשה מרכבה, which is connected to Mashiach. And we hope that the rainbows that we see should all be the good sight, the good signs, and it should be the last sign that we need for the coming of Mashiach במהרה.