Psalms 137

Psalm 137

Lament of the Exiles

¹By the rivers of Babylon — there we sat down and wept when we remembered Zion.²

³There we hung up our lyres on the poplar trees,⁴

⁵for our captors there asked us for songs, and our tormentors, for rejoicing: “Sing us one of the songs of Zion.”⁶

⁷How can we sing the Lord’s song on foreign soil?⁸

⁹If I forget you, Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill.¹⁰

¹¹May my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you, if I do not exalt Jerusalem as my greatest joy!¹²

¹³Remember, Lord, what the Edomites said that day at Jerusalem: “Destroy it! Destroy it down to its foundations!”¹⁴

¹⁵Daughter Babylon, doomed to destruction, happy is the one who pays you back what you have done to us.¹⁶

¹⁷Happy is he who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rocks.¹⁸