6 If I let you go out of my thoughts, and if I do not put Jerusalem before my greatest joy, let my tongue be fixed to the roof of my mouth.
And I will make your tongue fixed to the roof of your mouth, so that you have no voice and may not make protests to them: for they are an uncontrolled people.
My throat is dry like a broken vessel; my tongue is fixed to the roof of my mouth, and the dust of death is on my lips.
For a day in your house is better than a thousand. It is better to be a door-keeper in the house of my God, than to be living in the tents of sin.
The poor and crushed are looking for water where no water is, and their tongue is dry for need of it: I the Lord will give ear to their prayer, I the God of Israel will not give them up.
But let your first care be for his kingdom and his righteousness; and all these other things will be given to you in addition.
But I put no value on my life, if only at the end of it I may see the work complete which was given to me by the Lord Jesus, to be a witness of the good news of the grace of God.
For this cause, brothers, in all our trouble and grief we were comforted about you because of your faith; For it is life to us if you keep your faith in the Lord unchanged. For how great is the praise which we give to God for you, and how great the joy with which we are glad because of you before our God;
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Psalms 137
Commentary on Psalms 137 Matthew Henry Commentary
Psalm 137
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 (v. 8), 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
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.
Psa 137:1-6
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,
Psa 137:7-9
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.