Paraphrase Upon the Books of the Psalms, Book 5 · Psalm 137
The Hundred Thirty Seventh Psalm.
The hundred thirty seventh is a description of the sadness of the Babylonish captivity, and the peoples vehement desire and hopes to returne to Canaan; and seems to have been composed presently after the returne from the Captivity, or when they saw the taking and wasting of Babylon to approach.
1. BY the waters of Babylon there we sat down, yea we wept, when we remembred Zion.
Paraphrase. In the time of our deportation and captivity, being carried so farr, and deteined so long from the comforts of our own countrey, we had no divertisement but that of reposing our selves on the banks of Euphrates and Tigris, &c. and bewailing our losses, and recounting the felicities we once injoyed, when we were allowed the solemn publick meetings for the service of God at the Temple.
2. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.
As for the instruments of our Musick, which were wont to assist in the quire, and help to commemorate the mercies of God most chearfully, we could not think it a season to make use of them, and therefore hanged them on the trees in a neglected forlorne manner.
3. For there they that‖took us captive, foreign carried us away captive required of us a song, anda. they that†carried us up, wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.
Then they that had carried us up their captive slaves, would needs have us recite some of those joyous hymns which we were wont to sing in our solemn festivals at the Temple.
4. How shall we sing the Lords song in a strange land?
But our Levites gave answer presently, that it was not fit for them to sing those festival hymns that belonged to the praises of the God of Israel at a time of publick mourning, and withall in a land and among a people that acknowledged him not for God, or indeed any where but in the Temple, the place of his solemn festival worship.
5. If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right handb. ‖forget.forget her cunning.
'Tis not possible for us so to put off the memory of our sufferings, so to devest our selves of our great concernments and interests in the wellfare of Jerusalem, which now is despoiled of her inhabitants, or to put off the sorrow conceived for the loss of those joyfull advantages of Gods publick worship which there we injoyed: should we convert such dayes of mourning as these into seasons of joy, 'twere not fit we should ever more use those sacred instruments, set apart for the praising and glorifying of God;
6. If I doe not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, if I†or, advance not Jerusalem in the beginning of my joy, or mirth. prefer not Jerusalemc. above my chief joy.
Not fit we should ever be permitted to sing any joyfull hymn again, if we can think fit to apply it to such purposes as these, of pleasing or gratifying our oppressors, or indeed ever sing again, till we can celebrate our returne to our countrey and temple by our singing.
7. Remember, O Lord, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem, who said, Rase it, rase it even to the foundation thereof.
It is more seasonable for us to recount that sad time when our captivation befell us, when our unkind neighbours the Edumaeans were so forward to joyne their hands with our enemies to demolish our city and temple utterly; see Ezec. xxv. 12. But for this their malice, the time will come when they shall pay full dear; see Jer. xlix. 8.
8. O daughter of Babylon,d. *the destroyer,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.
But alas, this is not like to be their lot alone, but in the first place the Babylonians themselves, they which had laid our city wast, are sure to be sadly repayed: All their injuries and cruelties to us will be visited on the universality of them, even to their infant children; the youngest of them shall be dasht to the ground, and all their people within a while signally destroyed.
Annotations on Psalm CXXXVII.
V. 3. Wasted us] The Hebrew foreign foreignis from foreign to take, or lift, or carry up, and from thence the noune foreign is an heap, from that notion of elevating or raising; and from thence it is conceived by some learned men, that the verb here signifies laying wast, demolishing, and so turning cities into heaps, but without any example of such signification. Others would have it a participle, and so to signify their harps lifted, or hanged up, v. 2. But the antient Interpreters all accord in a facile interpretation, and that which agrees with the ordinary use of the word, for taking, or carrying up, as that is appliable to deportation or carrying up of captives from their own to another countrey. The Chaldee reads it foreign they that carried us away, from foreign to spoile, or prey on, and carry away (so that word is used Ezec. xxvi. 12. foreign, we read, they shall make a prey of, but the Chaldee there foreign, and they shall carry them away:) but the Lxxii. more expresly, foreign, they that led or carried us away, and the Syriack foreign and they that subdued us, (so foreign is rendred by the Lxxii. foreign subdued, Psal. xLvii. 3.) or, as the Syriack use is, carried us away. And so the Latine, qui abduxerunt nos, they that carried us away, and the Arabick, they that snatched us, or forcibly carried us thither. And thus it agrees well with foreign they that took us captive, foreign, they that captivated us (so foreign signifies) in the beginning of the verse. The Jewish Arab read foreign they that hanged us up, as Buxtorf in his Hebrew Concordance, Suspensores nostri. Abu Walid mislikes that it should be from foreign an heap, and would have ח not to be radical, but the Root to be foreign, and so the meaning to be, and, or when, or seeing our mournfull cry is to them joy, or rejoycing. Aben Ezra seems to dislike this (cited from Moses Hace.) and proposes two other conjectures: as 1. that foreign might in Hebrew signify to destroy, or pull down; 2. (which he saith is the opinion of some) that foreign should be all one with foreign, by change of letters, they that spoiled us.
V. 5. Forget her cunning] In the Hebrew there is no more but foreign foreignlet my right hand forget, which the Chaldee render foreign let me forget my right hand, and the Syriack foreign &c. let my right hand forget me, but the Lxxii. foreign let my right hand be forgotten. And thus it may well be, to express the great and fresh memory and care he hath of Jerusalem, that that shall certainly be the last thing which the Psalmist, or the Levites in the Psalm, will forget. But the conjunction here between the right hand and the tongue v. 6. as the two instruments of Musick, the one to play, as the other to sing, do rather incline it to be interpreted by supply of an Ellipsis, let my right hand forget, i. e. forget to play, as my tongue to sing, v. 6.
V. 6. Above my chief joy] The Hebrew foreign foreignhead is frequently used for the beginning of any thing, and not only for the principal part of it. Gen. ii. 10. four foreign heads are four beginnings, foreign say the Lxxii. of rivers. So here the Chaldee foreign the beginning, and so the Lxxii. foreign in the beginning of my mirth. And foreign I will lift up, or advance, Jerusalem in the beginning of my mirth, is to make that the prime or chief ingredient in their rejoycing, the principal subject of their hymns.
V. 8. Art to be destroyed] foreign foreignfrom foreign to lay wast, or destroy (in Paul instead of Poel, which is frequent) may be rendred vastatrix, destroyer. So the Chaldee, foreign the waster, or spoiler; and so the Syriack in the same word. OnelyOnly the Lxxii. reads foreign, which as it signifies miserable, so it signifies vile and wicked also: and so even the Hebrew, if taken in the passive, will be but answerable to foreign perditus, wretched, wicked, and so fit to be destroyed. The Jewish Arab reads O thou spoiled; and so 'tis agreeable to the custome of the Eastern people, by way of omen or presage, to put with the name of a city an Epithet of Preserved, or guarded, if they wish well to it: and so 'tis proportionable it should be in the contrary signification, if they wish ill to it, to speak of that as done, which they wish to be done.