So imagine you are Noah. You’ve been adrift with your family with no land in sight for over a year. You don’t even have a clue whether any land exists anymore. You’re family is getting tired of water and keeps asking “are we there yet?” So you pick out a bird that can travel long distances, a raven, and send it off to go scout for land. The raven came back with nothing. So you tell your family to hush up and get back to fishing. Time passes, your family refuses to eat another fish. You have to do something, so you choose a different bird… a dove.
Why did Noah choose a dove? The symbolism of the dove goes way, way back, and it varies a little bit. Ancient goddess traditions relate the dove to traditional feminine sexuality and mother symbolism. Alexander the Great sought wisdom from oracles that were associated with the dove. Slavic culture believes that the soul turns into a dove at the moment of death. Christians hold the dove as a form that the Holy Spirit can take, as well as a symbol of peace and promise. But across ancient cultures, before Christianity, the dove was considered the embodiment of maternal instinct. Noah and his family needed a sign of hope that new life was possible and his family needed the love and caring of the mothering dove to find it.
Native Americans honored the dove and used its feathers in prayer sticks. It’s soulful song became associated with life-giving water holes and springs. We westerners typically associate it with mourning, but on a deeper level, out of its mourning emerges new waters of life. This is a reminder for us that no matter how life looks right now, new life is still possible. Interestingly, the song of the dove in some Native American cultures is known as “the rain song.”
In the Bible, Dove is used for many things. In Song of Songs/ Song of Soloman, dove symbolizes long-standing fidelity between a man and a woman and is used as a descriptor for the Soul that we see in another’s eyes.
“Behold, you are beautiful, my love, behold, you are beautiful! Your eyes are doves behind your veil. Your hair is like a flock of goats leaping down the slopes of Gilead.” -Song of Solomon 4:1
Song of Solomon 5:12- “His eyes are like doves beside streams of water, bathed in milk, sitting beside a full pool.”
Just as dove is used to denote the Soul’s presence in the human body, the song of dove is also used to denote grief and mourning when the soul leaves the body.
Isaiah 59:10-12- “We grope for the wall like the blind; we grope like those who have no eyes; we stumble at noon as in the twilight, among those in full vigor we are like dead men. We all growl like bears; we moan and moan like doves; we hope for justice, but there is none; for salvation, but it is far from us. For our transgressions are multiplied before you, and our sins testify against us; for our transgressions are with us, and we know our iniquities.”
When I look at both of these, I see dove’s innocence, dove’s unabashed willingness to embrace its own self. Dove’s utter surrender to being dove, being 100% committed to being the core of dove when all of the layers are peeled back. Dove is unable to undertake any other method than to follow dove’s heart. Dove’s appearance in the Bible as the physical manifestation of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 3:16, Mark 1:10, Luke 3:22, John 1:32) leaves us to ask another question, why did God choose a dove? We may find a few clues in the Bible.
“be shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves.” -Matthew 10:16
There are several other references to dove being used as offerings signifying that it is considered a clean animal. That would make the choice of dove an appropriate choice for a vehicle for God. What is noteworthy is that God chose dove as a vessel for the Holy Spirit both in the Old Testament and New. Dove is a very potent symbol to Jewish people and Christians alike. So here one more way dove shines so brightly, as a bridge-builder between faiths, and that comes directly out of the maternal instinct of loving dove. Dove’s appearance now as a symbol of peace and promise in the world during this time is significant. When we let dove into our own heart, we can embrace our innocence.
