137:8 O daughter Babylon, soon to be devastated! 1
How blessed will be the one who repays you
for what you dished out to us! 2
137:9 How blessed will be the one who grabs your babies
and smashes them on a rock! 3
13:18 Their arrows will cut young men to ribbons; 4
they have no compassion on a person’s offspring, 5
they will not 6 look with pity on children.
1 tn Heb “O devastated daughter of Babylon.” The psalmist dramatically anticipates Babylon’s demise.
2 tn Heb “O the happiness of the one who repays you your wage which you paid to us.”
3 sn For other references to the wholesale slaughter of babies in the context of ancient Near Eastern warfare, see 2 Kgs 8:12; Isa 13:16; Hos 13:16; Nah 3:10.
4 tn Heb “and bows cut to bits young men.” “Bows” stands by metonymy for arrows.
5 tn Heb “the fruit of the womb.”
6 tn Heb “their eye does not.” Here “eye” is a metonymy for the whole person.
7 tn Grk “answering, all the people said.” This construction is somewhat redundant in English and has been simplified in the translation.
8 tn Or “that this generation may be charged with”; or “the blood of all the prophets… may be required from this generation.” This is a warning of judgment. These people are responsible for the shedding of prophetic blood.
9 tn Or “foundation.” However, this does not suggest a time to the modern reader.
10 tn The order of the clauses in this complicated sentence has been rearranged to simplify it for the modern reader.
11 sn Gen 4:10 indicates that Abel’s blood cried out for justice.
12 sn It is not clear which Zechariah is meant here. It is probably the person mentioned in 2 Chr 24:20-25.
13 tn Or “who perished.”
14 tn Or “and the temple”; Grk “and the house,” but in this context a reference to the house of God as a place of sanctuary.
15 tn Or “required from.”