Psalms 137 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.
Time Period
The Babylonian exile or shortly after it, between 586 and about 520 BC, with the destruction of Jerusalem still fresh in memory
Location
Beside the irrigation canals of Babylon in southern Mesopotamia, about 900 miles east of Jerusalem, remembering Zion far to the west
Audience
Judean exiles deported from Jerusalem, and later readers who inherited their memory of the catastrophe
Situation
Exiles sit weeping by the waterways of Babylon, having hung their harps in the poplars, because their captors demand cheerful songs of Zion as entertainment. The psalm ends with a bitter curse on Edom and on Babylon.
Key Background
Babylon was a land of canals, and deported communities were settled in work colonies along them, which is why the poem opens at water rather than in a city. Temple musicians were among the skilled people the Babylonians carried off, so the demand for a song of Zion was a real humiliation of professionals asked to perform their sacred repertoire as tavern music. Edom, Judah's neighbor to the southeast and a relative nation by descent from Esau, was remembered for cheering on the sack of Jerusalem instead of sheltering refugees, which is why the anger falls on Edom first.