mh_parser/vol_split/19 - Psalms/Chapter 137.xml

<div2 id="Ps.cxxxviii" n="cxxxviii" next="Ps.cxxxix" prev="Ps.cxxxvii" progress="68.74%" title="Chapter CXXXVII">
<h2 id="Ps.cxxxviii-p0.1">P S A L M S</h2>
<h3 id="Ps.cxxxviii-p0.2">PSALM CXXXVII.</h3>
<p class="intro" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p1">There are divers psalms which are thought to have
been penned in the latter days of the Jewish church, when prophecy
was near expiring and the canon of the Old Testament ready to be
closed up, but none of them appears so plainly to be of a late date
as this, which was penned when the people of God were captives in
Babylon, and there insulted over by these proud oppressors;
probably it was towards the latter end of their captivity; for now
they saw the destruction of Babylon hastening on apace (<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p1.1" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.8" parsed="|Ps|137|8|0|0" passage="Ps 137:8">ver. 8</scripRef>), which would be their
discharge. It is a mournful psalm, a lamentation; and the
Septuagint makes it one of the lamentations of Jeremiah, naming him
for the author of it. Here I. The melancholy captives cannot enjoy
themselves, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p1.2" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.1-Ps.137.2" parsed="|Ps|137|1|137|2" passage="Ps 137:1,2">ver. 1, 2</scripRef>.
II. They cannot humour their proud oppressors, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p1.3" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.3-Ps.137.4" parsed="|Ps|137|3|137|4" passage="Ps 137:3,4">ver. 3, 4</scripRef>. III. They cannot forget
Jerusalem, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p1.4" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.5-Ps.137.6" parsed="|Ps|137|5|137|6" passage="Ps 137:5,6">ver. 5, 6</scripRef>. IV.
They cannot forgive Edom and Babylon, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p1.5" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.7-Ps.137.9" parsed="|Ps|137|7|137|9" passage="Ps 137:7-9">ver. 7-9</scripRef>. In singing this psalm we must be
much affected with the concernments of the church, especially that
part of it that is in affliction, laying the sorrows of God's
people near our hearts, comforting ourselves in the prospect of the
deliverance of the church and the ruin of its enemies, in due time,
but carefully avoiding all personal animosities, and not mixing the
leaven of malice with our sacrifices.</p>
<scripCom id="Ps.cxxxviii-p1.6" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137" parsed="|Ps|137|0|0|0" passage="Ps 137" type="Commentary"/>
<scripCom id="Ps.cxxxviii-p1.7" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.1-Ps.137.6" parsed="|Ps|137|1|137|6" passage="Ps 137:1-6" type="Commentary"/><div class="Commentary" id="Bible:Ps.137.1-Ps.137.6">
<h4 id="Ps.cxxxviii-p1.8">The Sorrows of Captivity.</h4>
<p class="passage" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p2">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 <i>required of us</i> mirth, <i>saying,</i> Sing us <i>one</i>
of the songs of Zion.   4 How shall we sing the <span class="smallcaps" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p2.1">Lord</span>'s song in a strange land?   5 If I
forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget <i>her
cunning.</i>   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.</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p3">We have here the daughter of Zion covered
with a cloud, and dwelling with the daughter of Babylon; the people
of God in tears, but sowing in tears. Observe,</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4">I. The mournful posture they were in as to
their affairs and as to their spirits. 1. They were posted <i>by
the rivers of Babylon,</i> in a strange land, a great way from
their own country, whence they were brought as prisoners of war.
The land of Babylon was now a house of bondage to that people, as
Egypt had been in their beginning. Their conquerors quartered them
<i>by the rivers,</i> with design to employ them there, and keep
them to work in their galleys; or perhaps they chose it as the most
melancholy place, and therefore most suitable to their sorrowful
spirits. If they must build houses there (<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.1" osisRef="Bible:Jer.29.5" parsed="|Jer|29|5|0|0" passage="Jer 29:5">Jer. xxix. 5</scripRef>), it shall not be in the cities,
the places of concourse, but by the rivers, the places of solitude,
where they might mingle their tears with the streams. We find some
of them by the <i>river Chebar</i> (<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.2" osisRef="Bible:Ezek.1.3" parsed="|Ezek|1|3|0|0" passage="Eze 1:3">Ezek. i. 3</scripRef>), others by the <i>river Ulai,</i>
<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.3" osisRef="Bible:Dan.8.2" parsed="|Dan|8|2|0|0" passage="Da 8:2">Dan. viii. 2</scripRef>. 2. There they
<i>sat down</i> to indulge their grief by poring on their miseries.
Jeremiah had taught them under this yoke to <i>sit alone,</i> and
<i>keep silence,</i> and <i>put their mouths in the dust,</i>
<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.4" osisRef="Bible:Lam.3.28-Lam.3.29" parsed="|Lam|3|28|3|29" passage="La 3:28,29">Lam. iii. 28, 29</scripRef>. "We sat
down, as those that expected to stay, and were content, since it
was the will of God that it must be so." 3. Thoughts of Zion drew
tears from their eyes; and it was not a sudden passion of weeping,
such as we are sometimes put into by a trouble that surprises us,
but they were deliberate tears (we <i>sat down and wept</i>), tears
with consideration—we <i>wept when we remembered Zion,</i> the
holy hill on which the temple was built. Their affection to God's
house swallowed up their concern for their own houses. They
remembered Zion's former glory and the satisfaction they had had in
Zion's courts, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.5" osisRef="Bible:Lam.1.7" parsed="|Lam|1|7|0|0" passage="La 1:7">Lam. i. 7</scripRef>.
<i>Jerusalem remembered, in the days of her misery, all her
pleasant things which she had in the days of old,</i> <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.6" osisRef="Bible:Ps.42.4" parsed="|Ps|42|4|0|0" passage="Ps 42:4">Ps. xlii. 4</scripRef>. They remembered Zion's
present desolations, and <i>favoured the dust thereof,</i> which
was a good sign that the time for God to favour it was not far off,
<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.7" osisRef="Bible:Ps.102.13-Ps.102.14" parsed="|Ps|102|13|102|14" passage="Ps 102:13,14">Ps. cii. 13, 14</scripRef>. 4.
They laid by their instruments of music (<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.8" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.2" parsed="|Ps|137|2|0|0" passage="Ps 137:2"><i>v.</i> 2</scripRef>): <i>We hung our harps upon the
willows.</i> (1.) The harps they used for their own diversion and
entertainment. These they laid aside, both because it was their
judgment that they ought not to use them now that God called to
weeping and mourning (<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.9" osisRef="Bible:Isa.22.12" parsed="|Isa|22|12|0|0" passage="Isa 22:12">Isa. xxii.
12</scripRef>), and their spirits were so sad that they had no
hearts to use them; they brought their harps with them, designing
perhaps to use them for the alleviating of their grief, but it
proved so great that it would not admit the experiment. Music makes
some people melancholy. <i>As vinegar upon nitre, so is he that
sings songs to a heavy heart.</i> (2.) The harps they used in God's
worship, the Levites' harps. These they did not throw away, hoping
they might yet again have occasion to use them, but they laid them
aside because they had no present use for them; God had cut them
out other work by <i>turning their feasting into mourning and their
songs into lamentations,</i> <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.10" osisRef="Bible:Amos.8.10" parsed="|Amos|8|10|0|0" passage="Am 8:10">Amos viii.
10</scripRef>. Every thing is beautiful in its season. They did not
hide their harps in the bushes, or the hollows of the rocks; but
hung them up in view, that the sight of them might affect them with
this deplorable change. Yet perhaps they were faulty in doing this;
for praising God is never out of season; it is his will that we
should <i>in every thing give thanks,</i> <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p4.11" osisRef="Bible:Isa.24.15-Isa.24.16" parsed="|Isa|24|15|24|16" passage="Isa 24:15,16">Isa. xxiv. 15, 16</scripRef>.</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p5">II. The abuses which their enemies put upon
them when they were in this melancholy condition, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p5.1" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.3" parsed="|Ps|137|3|0|0" passage="Ps 137:3"><i>v.</i> 3</scripRef>. They had <i>carried them
away captive</i> from their own land and then <i>wasted them</i> in
the land of their captivity, took what little they had from them.
But this was not enough; to complete their woes they insulted over
them: They <i>required of us mirth and a song.</i> Now, 1. This was
very barbarous and inhuman; even an enemy, in misery, is to be
pitied and not trampled upon. It argues a base and sordid spirit to
upbraid those that are in distress either with their former joys or
with their present griefs, or to challenge those to be merry who,
we know, are out of tune for it. This is adding affliction to the
afflicted. 2. It was very profane and impious. No songs would serve
them but the <i>songs of Zion,</i> with which God had been
honoured; so that in this demand they reflected upon God himself as
Belshazzar, when he drank wine in temple-bowls. Their enemies
<i>mocked at their sabbaths,</i> <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p5.2" osisRef="Bible:Lam.1.7" parsed="|Lam|1|7|0|0" passage="La 1:7">Lam. i.
7</scripRef>.</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p6">III. The patience wherewith they bore these
abuses, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p6.1" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.4" parsed="|Ps|137|4|0|0" passage="Ps 137:4"><i>v.</i> 4</scripRef>. They
had laid by their harps, and would not resume them, no, not to
ingratiate themselves with those at whose mercy they lay; they
would not answer those fools according to their folly. Profane
scoffers are not to be humoured, nor pearls cast before swine.
David prudently <i>kept silence even from good</i> when the
<i>wicked were before him,</i> who, he knew, would ridicule what he
said and make a jest of it, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p6.2" osisRef="Bible:Ps.39.1-Ps.39.2" parsed="|Ps|39|1|39|2" passage="Ps 39:1,2">Ps.
xxxix. 1, 2</scripRef>. The reason they gave is very mild and
pious: <i>How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?</i>
They do not say, "How shall we sing when we are so much in sorrow?"
If that had been all, they might perhaps have put a force upon
themselves so far as to oblige their masters with a song; but "It
is the <i>Lord's song;</i> it is a sacred thing; it is peculiar to
the temple-service, and therefore we dare not sing it in the land
of a stranger, among idolaters." We must not serve common mirth,
much less profane mirth, with any thing that is appropriated to
God, who is sometimes to be honoured by a religious silence as well
as by religious speaking.</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p7">IV. The constant affection they retained
for Jerusalem, the city of their solemnities, even now that they
were in Babylon. Though their enemies banter them for talking so
much of Jerusalem, and even doting upon it, their love to it is not
in the least abated; it is what they may be jeered for, but will
never be jeered out of, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p7.1" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.5-Ps.137.6" parsed="|Ps|137|5|137|6" passage="Ps 137:5,6"><i>v.</i> 5,
6</scripRef>. Observe,</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p8">1. How these pious captives stood affected
to Jerusalem. (1.) Their heads were full of it. It was always in
their minds; they remembered it; they did not forget it, though
they had been long absent from it; many of them had never seen it,
nor knew any thing of it but by report, and by what they had read
in the scripture, yet it was graven upon the palms of their hands,
and even its ruins were continually before them, which was an
evidence of their faith in the promise of its restoration in due
time. In their daily prayers they opened their windows towards
Jerusalem; and how then could they forget it? (2.) Their hearts
were full of it. They <i>preferred</i> it <i>above</i> their
<i>chief joy,</i> and therefore they remembered it and could not
forget it. What we love we love to think of. Those that rejoice in
God do, for his sake, make Jerusalem their joy, and prefer it
before that, whatever it is, which is the head of their joy, which
is dearest to them in this world. A godly man will prefer a public
good before any private satisfaction or gratification
whatsoever.</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p9">2. How stedfastly they resolved to keep up
this affection, which they express by a solemn imprecation of
mischief to themselves if they should let it fall: "Let me be for
ever disabled either to sing or play on the harp if I so far forget
the religion of my country as to make use of my songs and harps for
the pleasing of Babylon's sons or the praising of Babylon's gods.
<i>Let my right hand forget her art</i>" (which the hand of an
expert musician never can, unless it be withered), "nay, <i>let my
tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth,</i> if I have not a good
word to say for Jerusalem wherever I am." Though they dare not sing
Zion's songs among the Babylonians, yet they cannot forget them,
but, as soon as ever the present restraint is taken off, they will
sing them as readily as ever, notwithstanding the long disuse.</p>
</div><scripCom id="Ps.cxxxviii-p9.1" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.7-Ps.137.9" parsed="|Ps|137|7|137|9" passage="Ps 137:7-9" type="Commentary"/><div class="Commentary" id="Bible:Ps.137.7-Ps.137.9">
<h4 id="Ps.cxxxviii-p9.2">The Sorrows of Captivity.</h4>
<p class="passage" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p10">7 Remember, <span class="smallcaps" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p10.1">O
Lord</span>, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who
said, Rase <i>it,</i> rase <i>it, even</i> to the foundation
thereof.   8 O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed;
happy <i>shall he be,</i> that rewardeth thee as thou hast served
us.   9 Happy <i>shall he be,</i> that taketh and dasheth thy
little ones against the stones.</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p11">The pious Jews in Babylon, having afflicted
themselves with the thoughts of the ruins of Jerusalem, here please
themselves with the prospect of the ruin of her impenitent
implacable enemies; but this not from a spirit of revenge, but from
a holy zeal for the glory of God and the honour of his kingdom.</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p12">I. The Edomites will certainly be reckoned
with, and all others that were accessaries to the destruction of
Jerusalem, that were aiding and abetting, that <i>helped forward
the affliction</i> (<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p12.1" osisRef="Bible:Zech.1.15" parsed="|Zech|1|15|0|0" passage="Zec 1:15">Zech. i.
15</scripRef>) and triumphed in it, that <i>said, in the day of
Jerusalem,</i> the day of her judgment, "<i>Rase it, rase it to the
foundations;</i> down with it, down with it; do not leave one stone
upon another." Thus they made the Chaldean army more furious, who
were already so enraged that they needed no spur. Thus they put
shame upon Israel, who would be looked upon as a people worthy to
be cut off when their next neighbours had such an ill-will to them.
And all this was a fruit of the old enmity of Esau against Jacob,
because he got the birthright and the blessing, and a branch of
that more ancient enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed
of the serpent: <i>Lord, remember</i> them, says the psalmist,
which is an appeal to his justice against them. Far be it from us
to avenge ourselves, if ever it should be in our power, but we will
leave it to him who has said, <i>Vengeance is mine.</i> Note, Those
that are glad at calamities, especially the calamities of
Jerusalem, shall not go unpunished. Those that are confederate with
the persecutors of good people, and stir them up, and set them on,
and are pleased with what they do, shall certainly be called to an
account for it against another day, and God will remember it
against them.</p>
<p class="indent" id="Ps.cxxxviii-p13">II. Babylon is the principal, and it will
come to her turn too to drink of the cup of tremblings, the very
dregs of it (<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p13.1" osisRef="Bible:Ps.137.8-Ps.137.9" parsed="|Ps|137|8|137|9" passage="Ps 137:8,9"><i>v.</i> 8,
9</scripRef>): <i>O daughter of Babylon!</i> proud and secure as
thou art, we know well, by the scriptures of truth, thou <i>art to
be destroyed,</i> or (as Dr. Hammond reads it) <i>who art the
destroyer.</i> The destroyers shall be destroyed, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p13.2" osisRef="Bible:Rev.13.10" parsed="|Rev|13|10|0|0" passage="Re 13:10">Rev. xiii. 10</scripRef>. And perhaps it is with
reference to this that the man of sin, the head of the
New-Testament Babylon, is called a <i>son of perdition,</i>
<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p13.3" osisRef="Bible:2Thess.2.3" parsed="|2Thess|2|3|0|0" passage="2Th 2:3">2 Thess. ii. 3</scripRef>. The
destruction of Babylon being foreseen as a sure destruction (thou
<i>art to be destroyed</i>), it is spoken of, 1. As a just
destruction. She shall be paid in her own coin: "Thou shalt be
served <i>as thou hast served us,</i> as barbarously used by the
destroyers as we have been by thee," See <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p13.4" osisRef="Bible:Rev.18.6" parsed="|Rev|18|6|0|0" passage="Re 18:6">Rev. xviii. 6</scripRef>. Let not those expect to find
mercy who, when they had power, did not show mercy. 2. As an utter
destruction. The very little ones of Babylon, when it is taken by
storm, and all in it are put to the sword, shall be dashed to
pieces by the enraged and merciless conqueror. None escape if these
little ones perish. Those are the seed of another generation; so
that, if they be cut off, the ruin will be not only total, as
Jerusalem's was, but final. It is sunk like a millstone into the
sea, never to rise. 3. As a destruction which should reflect honour
upon the instruments of it. Happy shall those be that do it; for
they are fulfilling God's counsels; and therefore he calls Cyrus,
who did it, his <i>servant,</i> his <i>shepherd,</i> his
<i>anointed</i> (<scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p13.5" osisRef="Bible:Isa.44.28 Bible:Isa.45.1" parsed="|Isa|44|28|0|0;|Isa|45|1|0|0" passage="Isa 44:28,45:1">Isa. xliv. 28;
xlv. 1</scripRef>), and the soldiers that were employed in it his
<i>sanctified ones,</i> <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p13.6" osisRef="Bible:Isa.13.3" parsed="|Isa|13|3|0|0" passage="Isa 13:3">Isa. xiii.
3</scripRef>. They are making way for the enlargement of God's
Israel, and happy are those who are in any way serviceable to that.
The fall of the New-Testament Babylon will be the triumph of all
the saints, <scripRef id="Ps.cxxxviii-p13.7" osisRef="Bible:Rev.19.1" parsed="|Rev|19|1|0|0" passage="Re 19:1">Rev. xix. 1</scripRef>.</p>
</div></div2>