A strange verse
A
strange (at first glance) verse of the Holy
Bible is found in the Book of Psalms 137:7-9,
where we read the following:
“Remember
o Lord the sons of Edom, who, on the day of (the destruction of)
Jerusalem, had said,
‘Evacuate her, evacuate her, even to her
foundations’. O daughter of Babylon, you
wretched one; blessed is he, who shall repay you
with the same repayment that you repaid us.
Blessed is he, who shall prevail over you
and shall throw down your infants against
the rock .”
The question, justifiably, that comes to mind
from this verse is: How is it possible for God
to bless the one who will throw down the infants
of Babylon against the rock ? What did those
poor infants do to deserve it?
This verse was promptly attacked by various
enemies of the truth, neo-Pagans and atheists,
in their attempt to show that the Holy Bible
allegedly encourages people to act barbarically.
Naturally, with this stance of theirs, they have
made their negative intentions very obvious and
have thus drawn from the Holy Bible the
message that befits their personality.
But, as we have already said, the Holy Bible is
a
"Jacob’s
well",
from which one can draw according to his
intentions, good or bad. Let us therefore leave
the ill-intentioned to their rejoicing (that
they have supposedly found something sinister in
the Holy Bible), and let us see what we
Christians will draw from this Well of Truth!
We
shall be giving three aspects of interpretation
of this verse further down - Historic, Prophetic and
Spiritual; let every
Christian therefore draw according to his needs.
The Historical events of that era
First of all, let us carefully examine the
content of the verse in question:
This psalm was chanted by the captives who had
been transferred out of Jerusalem, after its
destruction in the year 587 b.C. and before the destruction of
Babylon in 539 b.C.
by the Persian armies of Cyrus. If we read this
psalm from the beginning, we shall discern the
nostalgia that the Judean refugees felt, as well
as their indignation towards Babylon, and we
shall also discern their hopes for repatriation,
according to the
relative prophecies
that they believed in.
The object of their indignation is Babylon – the
international power at the time – and it is
against Babylon that they are protesting. In
this psalm, they are recalling everything that
Babylon had done to them; they are also
remembering their children, whom the Babylonians
had killed by dashing them against rocks, and
they feel their indignation overflowing. As a
result,
they are inclined to add that whoever renders
unto the Babylonians the same malice that they
had shown to the Judeans, will be worthy of
being blessed. This would make them feel
vindicated for their calamity.
This is the cry of anger by parents who had
witnessed their children being dashed to death
against rocks by the Babylonian soldiers, and
their yearning for retaliation and justice. We
should remember here that, at the time, justice
was meted out through the maxim “an eye for
an eye and a tooth for a tooth”, therefore
this yearning was actually a rather
“progressive” one for their time; in an era when
an avenger normally required that his enemy be
punished with a sevenfold punishment, Israel had
been taught by its own Law that it should not
exceed the extent of the enemy’s actions if it
were to retaliate – only to respond with
something equivalent. Centuries would have to
pass, before Christ would teach them that full
justice was not retaliation at all, but
forgiveness! Thus, in this context, in the era
that those people were living, and with the
mentality that prevailed, it was only normal for
those parents who had witnessed their children
being dashed against rocks by the Babylonians to
desire an equivalent justice to be meted out,
considering as “blessed” whoever would return
the evil that the Babylonians had done – again,
in accordance with the notion of justice they
had at the time.
But how do we know that the Babylonians had
indeed inflicted such a crime on those infants?
This is very clearly revealed in the words of
the Psalm itself. It says: “…..who
shall repay you with the same repayment
that you repaid us.
Blessed be he, who shall prevail over you and
shall throw down your infants
against the rock …”.
The chanting Israelites had indeed seen their
infants being killed in that manner by the
Babylonian idolaters, which
explains why they were demanding
retaliation, and the restitution of justice
through retaliation.
It
is interesting to note however,
that they themselves did not desire to be the
ones to retaliate for the tragedy that had
befallen them; perhaps because they didn’t have
the power, or perhaps because they were aware of
the prophecies regarding these events, and that
retaliation would actually take place, after the
end of the
70-year
domination by the Babylonians. Those chanting
here are calling “blessed”
the one who will bring justice by returning the
same measure to the Babylonians. Notice here
that they are not ascribing the term “blessed”
to the avenger for the sake of the murders of
the infants; they are calling “blessed” the one
who will generally fulfill that retaliation. The
reason they stress the infants in their psalm is
because that is what pained them most, when they
recalled how they had been cruelly dashed to
death against the rocks. The mention of “infants on the
rocks” was a highlighting of their
personal suffering, expressed as a parent’s
complaint after watching his child die in that
manner, and his desire for the punishment of the
guilty party in the same manner.
But this punishment was
not to be meted
out by the wronged Judeans themselves; it was to
be executed eventually, by another barbaric, idolatrous
people, the Persians, who had that same,
idolatrous tradition.
This gruesome, inhuman tradition of the
Babylonians and other idolaters was customary
during that period of time. We can see such
barbarities in Maccabees B,
5:13
“There
were also killings of young and old, a
destruction of men and women and children, and
slaughtering of virgins
and
infants.”
This was therefore a familiar custom during that
era - a custom of idolaters - and it did not
make the same impression then as it does today;
in other words, it was a standard practice of
idolaters whenever they conquered a city.
Prophetic interpretation of the verse
But someone might say “OK, this psalm may have
been a cry of indignation by the expatriated
Judeans, but what business does it have in the
Holy Bible? How does it benefit us today, to
have this psalm in a sacred book?
Let us examine one of the parameters of this
prophecy, and then a second one....
First of all,
we
could
point out that the Holy Bible is a prophetic
book; however, the understanding of its
prophecies – which are purposely veiled – is not
revealed to people who are not acquainted with
the Holy Bible, and certainly not to ill-meaning
Neo-Pagans and Atheists.
For someone to interpret the Holy Bible properly
he must first of all be within the framework of
Orthodox dogmatics and tradition and then either
look to the Holy Bible itself to provide that
interpretation, or look for it in the holy
Fathers, who are bearers of Divine Grace and
possess God’s revelation for such requirements.
Before moving on to the matter of revelation
through God’s Saints, let us see how the Holy
Bible itself interprets this verse in question.
To
recall:
“Blessed be he, who shall prevail over
you and shall throw down your infants
against the rock .”
What here is the inference behind the word
“rock ” in the Holy Bible?
Let’s see:
3…….for
the
Lord is benevolent, 4 approaching Whom as though
unto a living
rock
– one disapproved indeed by people, but to God a
select one, and precious […] 6 This is why it
is contained in the scripture that: “Behold, I
place in Zion a
cornerstone : a select
one and valuable; and whoever believes in it
shall not be disgraced. 7 Honour, therefore,
is befitting to you who believe; but to those
who are undutiful, the ‘rock
’,
which those who build have disapproved, the same
has become the cornerstone and the
stumbling-block and the rock of scandal, 8
for, by being undutiful, they stumble upon the
Logos, unto Whom they were appointed…” (1
Peter 2:3-8)
We
see here clearly what the inference
behind the word
“rock
”
is: it is
Jesus Christ!
He is the one Whom the many disapproved
of, but Who became the “cornerstone ” that held
up His Universal Church; He is the One
whose enemies trip over and stumble and are
scandalized by His words of Truth.
Who, then, are the ones that are crushed when
striking a rock ?
Naturally those who have “struck” it!
Obviously, if you hit a rock , the rock is not
the one that will be hurt, but….you! The same
is written about the nations of the Antichrist
that will be attacking Christ: “He
shall rule them with a rod of iron; they shall
be smashed, like a potter’s vessels.”
(Revelation
2:27).
And as prophesied by Moses (regarding Christ):
“…I
shall raise unto them a Prophet from among their
brethren, just as with you, and I shall give My
utterance in His mouth and He shall utter to
them whatever I shall instruct Him to. And the
man who does not hearken to what the Prophet
says in My name, I shall seek revenge of him…”
(Deuteronomy 18:18-19)
However, the verse we are examining here also
mentions “infants of Babylon”. Which,
therefore, is the “Babylon” referred to
prophetically, and who are her infants?
In a previous study,
we
have presented
all the data indicating that
the
“Babylon”
prophetically
referred to is
Zionist Jerusalem - the political-religious
capital of the Antichrist.
Please take a moment to
check out
that study
so
that you can verify all the information on the
specific topic.
But “Babylon” in the Holy Bible is also called “the
mother of whores and of the abominations of the
earth”
(Revelation 17:5). From these words, we must
firstly surmise that her “infants” are “the
abominations of the earth”, but, we must
also realize something else: that by being
called “a mother of”, these words also link
Babylon through Time; in other words, the
Antichrist’s “Babylon” is directly
linked/related to ancient Babylon. Because it
is ancient Babylon who was the mother of the
earth’s abominations. It was from ancient
Babylon that godless idolatry spread throughout
the known world.
Even in ancient idolatrous Greece, all its
profane idolatrous and
licentious ‘gods’
had originated from Babylon -
both directly, but also indirectly, through
Egypt; lewd ‘gods’ and ‘goddesses’, such as
Astarte, Aphrodite and many others.
Thus, apart from her role
as an eschatological
whore in the prophecies of the Holy Bible,
“Babylon” also holds the place of that
historical, idolatrous and godless “Babylon of
falsehood”, which leads mankind away from the
true God and into idolatry and immorality. Just
as the Antichrist who, although expected to
become incarnate during the last days of the
world and yet, the “spirit
of the Antichrist”
(1 John 2:18, 4:3) has already permeated the
world, thus in the same manner,
beyond the Eschatological incarnation of
“Babylon” into a Zionist, pseudo “church” and
political-religious capital, the spirit of its
whoredom has already pervaded the world, over
Time.
Its “infants” are the abominations of the
earth, along with all those who oppose and clash
with the rock – Jesus Christ.
The human offspring of “Babylon” are most
assuredly the offspring of whoredom:
4
And I shall not be merciful to her children, for
they are children of whoredom; 5 for their
mother was a whore.”
(Hosea 2: 4,5).
Hosea’s prophecy is addressed precisely to that
whore called Babylon, who may present her
children as children of God but in reality they
are nothing more than the offspring of her
whoredom, with Satan. And we have been provided
sufficient detail on this, by Christ Himself:
34
Jesus replied to them, “Verily, verily I say
to you, that anyone who commits sin is a servant
of sin, 35 and a servant does not remain in the
household forever: the son does remain forever.
36 If the Son therefore shall set you free, you
shall indeed be free. 37 I know you to be
Abraham's seed; and yet, you seek to kill me,
because my words find no place among you. 38 I
speak of that which I have seen near my Father;
you therefore are doing that which you have seen
near your father.”
39 They
replied, saying to Him, “Our father is
Abraham.”
Jesus
said to them, “If you were Abraham's
children, you would be doing the works of
Abraham. 40 But now you seek to kill me, a man
who spoke the truth to you which I heard from
God; this, Abraham did not do. 41 You are
therefore doing the works of your father.”
Then
they said to him, “We were not born of
whoredom. We have a Father: God.”
42
Jesus therefore said to them, “If God was
your Father, you would have loved me, for I came
forth from within God and have come here; and
neither did I come of my own
(initiative),
but He has sent me. 43 Why do you not recognize
my voice? It is because you cannot bear to
listen to my words. 44 You are of your father
the devil, and you will do the wishes of your
father. He was a man-killer from the beginning,
and he does not remain in the truth, because
there is no truth in him. When he utters a lie,
he utters it of his own (initiative),
for he is a liar, and is the father of lies. 45
Thus, because I tell you the truth, you do not
believe me.” (John
8: 34-45).
So, that is who the children of whoredom, the
children of Babylon and the Devil are: They are
all those who reject the words of the Lord and
oppose them. They are the servants of sin, who
perform the “abominations of the earth.”
But why does the verse being examined refer
SPECIFICALLY to the children of Babylon? And
who is that “blessed potentate” who will dash
her abominable children against the “rock ”,
Christ?
In
every city and land, it is the children that
ensure the survival of the next generation.
Similarly in the case of Babylon, it is her
children (=her spiritual descendants and
successors) who ensure the continuation of her
godless polemics and falsehood in every
generation throughout Time. That is why the
prophecy calls “blessed” the one who will put an
end to the perennial existence of Babylon’s
offspring of whoredom; the one who will leave
no traces of falsehood on the planet, so
that the Truth of Christ can prevail thereafter.
Naturally, the first and foremost “blessed” one
is Christ Himself, “the
blessed and only Potentate, the king of kings
and lord of lords”
(1 Timothy 6:15), Who will crush all falsehood.
The children of Babylon have repeatedly
vanquished the children of God’s Church,
whenever the Church of God alienated Herself
from Him and forfeited His protection. But God
ensured that there would always be “children”
left over for His Church, as the “remnant” for
Her salvation:
25
But thus said the Lord: “For the captives of the
mighty shall be removed, and the booty of the
formidable shall be taken away; for I will
contend with him that contends against you, and
I
will save your children.”
(Isaiah 49:25)
But when it comes to Babylon (and
when the time comes),
Christ
will not leave a single remnant of hers behind:
1
Thus said the Lord: “Behold, I shall raise up
against Babylon and against the inhabitant
Chaldeans a
scorching, destructive wind; 2 and I shall send
slanderers unto Babylon, who shall thoroughly
slander her and shall overrun her land. Woe
be to Babylon all
around, on the day of her injury. 3 Let him
stretch his bow who will stretch it, and let him
who has weapons gird himself with them, and
do
not spare her young men and eliminate all her
power.”
(Jeremiah 51:1-3).
When the time for Babylon’s final fall is come,
there will be no “descendants” left to continue
her godless politics. All of her power will have
vanished, just as something is cremated by fire:
18
And they cried out loud when they saw the smoke
of her burning, saying, “What city is like this
great city? 19 And they threw earth upon their
heads, and they cried out, weeping and mourning,
saying, ‘woe, woe to the great city, in which
were made rich all those who had ships in the
sea out of her precious goods, for in one hour
has she been laid waste.’ 20 Rejoice over her o
heaven, and you saints and apostles and
prophets, for God has decided to render His
judgement on your behalf, on her. 21 And a
mighty angel lifted up a rock as big as a
millstone , and cast it into the sea, saying,
‘Thus, with force, shall that great city Babylon
be cast down, and shall never be found again’.
(Revelation
18:
19-21).
Reference therefore to the children of Babylon
is made in order to point out that there will be
no remnant of Babylon left over in the end, and
that her fall - which will be the repayment for
all her whoredom – will be final and
irreversible.
And finally,
why is the word “infants” used, for the children
of Babylon?
This term is not used in order to denote any
innocence. There is no innocence in offspring of
whoredom who war against God, and furthermore,
God does not punish the innocent.
The word “infants” carries another meaning. Let
us again allow the Holy Bible to explain what it
implies:
14
That we no longer be as
infants,
wavering and shifting about with every wind of
doctrine, within the sleight of men, in cunning,
towards the ways of deceit….”
(Ephesians
4:14).
3
thus also we, when we were
infants,
were subservient to the elements of the world
[…] 8 but then, by not knowing God,
you served
those who are gods not by nature.
(Galatians
4: 3
and
8).
This, therefore, is why they are called
“infants”:
the
Bible wants to stress their subservience to
falsehood and idolatry, away from the true God.
With the above,
everything
becomes clear
in
the prophetic landscape that we are examining;
the “infants” that are to be dashed to death
against the “rock ” are the idolaters and the
abominations of the earth, who, being the
genuine offspring of the whore Babylon, will
confront Christ – the stumbling block on which
they will trip and be crushed.
Spiritual
–
hesychast interpretation
It
is from this same verse however,
that hesychasts also draw their strength, for
their spiritual course. They too draw from the
same foundation:
Christ is again the “rock”; “Babylon” is
spiritual confusion and corruption, and the
“infants of Babylon” are wicked thoughts, which,
when reaching adulthood, become sins. That is
why a Christian must exterminate evil thoughts
from the moment they are generated, while they
are still “infantile” and still “thoughts” –
before they “grow up” and turn into a sinful
act. These wicked thoughts can be crushed on
the rock that is Christ, when a Christian -with
the prayer of the heart- recites the sweetest of
all names, that of our Lord Jesus Christ, and
thus deflects evil contemplations.
With sobriety and a keen watch over one’s mind,
Man can vanquish sin and thus become “blessed”.
However, given that the vessel of our
spirituality is a tiny one, it is not spacious
enough to draw even more water from the
inexhaustible water-well of life found in this
verse; however, a spiritual person can draw far
more, for the edification of the Church.
Behold the reason therefore, for the existence
of this verse in the Holy Bible; so that each
one of us can draw whatever he needs:
The
historian
for the data on the idolatrous barbarity of
ancient times,
The
faithful interpreter
for its prophetic elements
And the
Hesychast,
for those elements that will guide him towards
“nepsis” (awareness).
As
for the
ill-intentioned
reader of this article, it is only to be
expected that he will be scandalized and stumble
over this rock called Christ, because he is
still an “infant” - still subservient to the
elements of this world and oblivious to the
spiritual ones. He will be looking for wicked
thoughts against Christ. That is why his demise
will be to be crushed when he stumbles over
Christ, Whom he has scorned.
