# 137  

> $^7$Remember, O LORD, against the Edomites
  the day of Jerusalem,
  how they said, “Lay it bare, lay it bare,
  down to its foundations!”
  $^8$O daughter of Babylon, doomed to be destroyed,
  blessed shall he be who repays you
  with what you have done to us!
  $^9$Blessed shall he be who takes your little ones
  and dashes them against the rock!

I quite often pick passages that are favourites of mine, or passages that speak to me or challenge me in some way. These verses on the other hand are some I find very difficult and verse 9 in particular I just recoil at. It always brings to mind  how I've read about the same thing sometimes happening when people arrived at Nazi concentration camps. To wish such a thing even on your enemies is deep hatred.  

It's something I find hard to reconcile with the call to love our enemies. To be peacemakers. To be worshippers of a God who proclaims that he hates violence. 

The Psalms do contain outpouring of emotion, some happy, some desperately sad, some full of rage.

Perhaps the best thing to remember is how hard we make it for people to forgive us when we do them wrong, how hard we make it for people to love us and not hate us. 

Perhaps it is also good to reflect on what people who hate may have been through. The writer of this Psalm has been devastated by what the Edomites have done to him and his people and his city.