Forgetting Jerusalem from the Bible to Faulkner Essay

Forgetting Jerusalem from the Bible to Faulkner - Essay Example He then imprecates God to remember what the Babylonians did to Jerusalem. How they tore down the city to its foundations, and treated it as something worthless. Having his beloved nation torn down as something worthless, the Psalmist curses the daughters of Babylon. He desires revenge, seeking that what they had done to the children of Zion, too, will be done unto them - having their infants snatched and dashed against the rocks! Psalm 137 is basically a song of anger, as well as of a desire for revenge for all the wrongdoing that has been implicated to him and his people. He is singing to God, reminding Him of his faithfulness, and seeking justice for him and his nation. The harsh, cursing prayer song of the Psalmist to God against the Babylonians in Psalm 137 shows that in these kinds of prayers, cursing the enemy or offender, is due to the believers feeling of distress. In 1 Samuel 24-26, it is shown how David, a model of patience, who on more than one occasion refused to avenge himself on his persecutor Saul. David spares Saul. As any other man, David had weaknesses, and one of these was being too lenient. He was compassionate with such offenders as Shimei, who cursed him (in 2 Samuel 16), and his son Absalom, who rebelled against him (2 Samuel 18-19). David didn't seek out personal vengeance upon his enemies and offenders, but in his prayers, he could hardly pray for compassion upon them. In his prayers, he could not bring himself to sincerely pray to God that Saul should win or that God's promise to him which included the promise of the Savior should be overthrown by Saul or Absalom. He very much opposed their schemes with prayer. Psalm 137 is a very reflective work by the original writer with overtones that reach into the lives of all of us today. Until such time as the knowledge of Yahweh fills the earth as it was written by Jeremiah, we are waiting by the "river of Babylon" with our captors, struggling to make sense of the things that are before us in our daily lives. Just as it is stated in Jeremiah 31:33-34, "But this is the covenant that I will make the house of Israel after those days, says Yahweh, I will put My law in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people; and they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying: 'Know Yahweh; 'for they shall all know Me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, says Yahweh; for I will