Salmi 137

1 Là presso i fiumi di Babilonia, sedevamo ed anche piangevamo ricordandoci di Sion.

2 Ai salici delle sponde avevamo appese le nostre cetre.

3 Poiché là quelli che ci avevan menati in cattività ci chiedevano dei canti, quelli che ci predavano, delle canzoni d’allegrezza, dicendo: Cantateci delle canzoni di Sion!

4 Come potremmo noi cantare le canzoni dell’Eterno in terra straniera?

5 Se io ti dimentico, o Gerusalemme, dimentichi la mia destra le sue funzioni,

6 resti la mia lingua attaccata al palato se io non mi ricordo di te, se non metto Gerusalemme al disopra d’ogni mia allegrezza.

7 Ricordati, o Eterno, dei figliuoli di Edom, che nel giorno di Gerusalemme dicevano: Spianatela, spianatela, fin dalle fondamenta!

8 O figliuola di Babilonia, che devi esser distrutta, beati chi ti darà la retribuzione del male che ci hai fatto!

9 Beato chi piglierà i tuoi piccoli bambini e li sbatterà contro la roccia!

Salmi 137 Commentary

Chapter 137

The Jews bewail their captivity. (1-4) Their affection for Jerusalem. (5-9)

Verses 1-4 Their enemies had carried the Jews captive from their own land. To complete their woes, they insulted over them; they required of them mirth and a song. This was very barbarous; also profane, for no songs would serve but the songs of Zion. Scoffers are not to be compiled with. They do not say, How shall we sing, when we are so much in sorrow? but, It is the Lord's song, therefore we dare not sing it among idolaters.

Verses 5-9 What we love, we love to think of. Those that rejoice in God, for his sake make Jerusalem their joy. They stedfastly resolved to keep up this affection. When suffering, we should recollect with godly sorrow our forfeited mercies, and our sins by which we lost them. If temporal advantages ever render a profession, the worst calamity has befallen him. Far be it from us to avenge ourselves; we will leave it to Him who has said, Vengeance is mine. Those that are glad at calamities, especially at the calamities of Jerusalem, shall not go unpunished. We cannot pray for promised success to the church of God without looking to, though we do not utter a prayer for, the ruin of her enemies. But let us call to mind to whose grace and finished salvation alone it is, that we have any hopes of being brought home to the heavenly Jerusalem.

Chapter Summary

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 137

The occasion of this psalm was the captivity of the Jews in Babylon, and the treatment they met with there; either as foreseen, or as now endured. Aben Ezra ascribes this psalm to David; and so the Syriac version, which calls it,

``a psalm of David; the words of the saints, who were carried captive into Babylon.''

The Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, and Ethiopic versions, make it to be David's, and yet add the name of Jeremiah; and the Arabic version calls it David's, concerning Jeremiah: but, as Theodoret observes, Jeremiah was not carried into Babylon, but, after some short stay in or near Jerusalem, was forced away into Egypt; and could neither be the writer nor subject of this psalm: and though it might be written by David under a spirit of prophecy; who thereby might foresee and foretell the Babylonish captivity, and what the Jews would suffer in it; as the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah did, many years before it came to pass; yet it seems rather to have been written by one of the captivity, either while in it, or immediately after it.