Summer in the Psalms 07 - Psalm 137 (Imprecatory Psalms, Part 2)

Psalm 137

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

1 

By the rivers of Babylon—

    there we sat down, and there we wept

    when we remembered Zion.

2 

On the willows there

    we hung up our harps.

3 

For there our captors

    asked us for songs,

and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying,

    “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

4 

How could we sing the Lord’s song

    in a foreign land?

5 

If I forget you, O Jerusalem,

    let my right hand wither!

6 

Let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth,

    if I do not remember you,

if I do not set Jerusalem

    above my highest joy.

7 

Remember, O Lord, against the Edomites

    the day of Jerusalem’s fall,

how they said, “Tear it down! Tear it down!

    Down to its foundations!”

8 

O daughter Babylon, you devastator!

    Happy shall they be who pay you back

    what you have done to us!

9 

Happy shall they be who take your little ones

    and dash them against the rock!