Psalm 137, Saturday, May 11, 2024

Psalm 137 (KJV)

Psalms 137:1   By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. 2 We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. 3 For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. 4 How shall we sing the LORD’S song in a strange land? 5 If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. 6 If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy.

Psalms 137:7   Remember, O LORD, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof. 8 O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us. 9 Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.

Today we look at what is arguably the most difficult imprecatory psalm in the Bible. At first glance, it looks like a celebration of genocide, but that’s not the case, as we will see. Let’s dig in…

Verses 1-4: The Distress Of Captivity

V1: The remnant of Judah is in a refugee camp by the river Chebar, in Babylon (see Ezekiel chapter 1). Some scholars believe this was a canal that was built under Nebuchadnezzar to connect the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers. This would make sense then to keep the captivity there to perform the manual labor. It would also fit the context of the plural word “rivers”.

V2-4: The Linnaeus Salix Babylonica is a species of weeping willow found all around the ponds and in oases in the Plain of Acre in that area of Babylon.

• The Jews there refused to be performers when their captors demanded that they sing the “songs of Zion”.

• Notice how the Babylonians demanded songs of joy from a broken heart. The world looks at this as a cruelty, and it is. Yet our faith is supposed to be strong enough to find the Joy of the Lord in any situation. To me, the cruelty is in making an external demand for mere entertainment.

• But the reality of their spiritual condition is that they had no joy. They were experiencing judgment for their sin and turning away from God. He sent them warning after warning, and they refused to repent.

• And now they simply cannot sing. Contrast this with the character of Job, who WORSHIPPED as he mourned when he lost his children and his wealth (Job 1:20).

Verses 5-6: The Determination Of The Captives

• They vow to remember their home, and their capital, the chief center of their worship. -They vow to return and worship once again. This implies remembering the promises of grace the prophets made by those who entered in to captivity while those who refused and determined to fight on against Babylon would all be destroyed.

• This is the beginning of their repentance, as I see it.

Verses 7-9 The Destruction Of The Cheerers

• God here prophesies the destruction of Edom as judgment for rooting for the Babylonians as they sacked Jerusalem and burned it to the ground.

• God says that the Babylonians would rejoice as they murdered even the women and children of the cities that resisted their expansion.

• Again, this is not Israel’s happiness, but Babylon’s. This is not the psalmist’s rejoicing in infanticide, but a warning that it is coming because the Edomites sided against their Israel when Babylon invaded the land.

• Likewise, we must be careful not to rejoice when our enemies fail, but rather, rejoice in God’s goodness and grace when he chooses to give it. Everyone will face calamities in their days, but how we react to the troubles of others is a reflection of our own character. And God is just, and he will hold us accountable as well.

• As a historical lesson, this prophecy of the Babylonian destruction of Edom actually came to pass. The Edomites never re-entered their original homeland. They would move into southern Judea, between Jerusalem and Beersheba after the Persians freed their captivity. The Greeks called this area “Idumea” and it is geographically distinct from the pre-captivity land of Edom. The Edomites/Idumeans would later convert to Judaism, and Antipater the Indumean, who sided with Julius Caesar against Pompey Magnus, was rewarded with the rule of this lands of Idumea and Judea. His son, Herod the Great, expanded to Jewish Temple to is largest size, and later killed all the male babies under two years old who were in Bethlehem to prevent Jesus from becoming king in fulfillment of multiple,e prophecies, showing a willingness to inflict upon others what had happened to his own people.

I am curious to hear all of your thought on this Psalm.