Psalms 137

Which worship songs are based on Psalms 137?

  1. Bye Bye Babylon — Elevation Worship (2022) Psalms 137:1-4

    The Babylonian setting, willow tree, suspended harp, and recovery of Zion’s songs unmistakably reverse Psalm 137’s scene of exiles silenced by grief.

  2. Bring Us Back — Joshua Aaron (2018) Psalms 137:1-4

    The verses closely reproduce the psalm's setting and details: exiles mourning beside Babylon's waterways, instruments suspended from trees, captors demanding songs of Zion, and the difficulty of sacred singing outside the land.

Psalms 137 (King James Version)

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 required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.

4 How shall we sing the LORD’s song in a strange land?

5 If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning.

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.

7 Remember, O LORD, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof.

8 O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us.

9 Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.