Two versions of the 137th Psalm have been given to the Christian world by the Church of England, and they differ in some minor points of the translations. That in the Psalter of the Prayer Book was one of the earliest works of the Reformation, taken from the Septuagint, in the time of Archbishop Cranmer. It does not name the tree on which the Israelites hung their harps. “ By the waters of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered thee, O Sion. As for our harps, we hanged them up upon the trees that are therein. For they that led us away captive required of us then a song and melody in our heaviness. Sing us one of the songs of Sion.” The translation in the Holy Bible, made later, from the original, approaches still nearer to the simple dignity of the Hebrew: “ By the waters of Babylon there we sat down, yea, we wept when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. 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.”
The two translations of this noble Psalm, also differ slightly in their last verses. In the Prayer Book, these verses stand as follows: “ O, daughter of Babylon, wasted with misery, yea, happy shall he be that rewardeth thee, as thou hast served us. Blessed shall he be that taketh thy children and dasheth them against the stones.” The translation of the Holy Bible, by closer adherence to the original, in a single phrase becomes more directly prophetic in character: “O, daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed (or wasted), happy shall he be that rewardeth thee, as thou hast served us. Happy shall he be that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.}}
