Rabbi Raymond Apple

Q. The end of Psalm 137 (“Al Naharot Bavel”) says, “Blest is he who takes and shatters your infants against the rock”. How can the Psalm say something so offensive and vengeful?

A. Psalm 137 is a sad reflection of how bitter it was for the remnants of the Jewish people to be in Babylon and suffer under the harshness of the regime.

Imagine how the enemy taunted them: “Go on, sing one of your Jewish songs!”

What heartache is expressed in the verse, “How can we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?”

No wonder the people pledged to themselves and to God that they would never forget their Jewish identity, and they prayed that the Day of the Lord would overcome Babylon.

How many times over the last 2000 years did Jews echo this psalm…

What a tragedy it is that now that Jews can freely live a Jewish life in Israel, so many have got used to life in the Diaspora…

What a pity that it is resurgent antisemitism that is making European Jews interested in Aliyah….

The last verse of the Psalm is not a statement of religious dogma, but part of a poem, and no-one has to automatically applaud the poet’s phraseology.

It is one of several so-called psalms of vengeance, and in each case the idea is that those who commit wrongs will one day get a dose of their own medicine. Hence if the Babylonians were cruel to Jewish children, their own children will eventually suffer.

This may not be the noblest of sentiments, but it is the anguished cry of a people undergoing horrific suffering.

PSALM 137

1. By Babylon’s rivers,
There we sat, we wept
When we thought of Zion.

2. Upon the willows in its midst
We hung up our harps –

3. For there our captors asked us for song,
Our tormentors wanted mirth:
“Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

4. How can we sing the Lord’s song
In a strange land?

5. If I forget you, Jerusalem,
Let my right hand wither;

6. Let my tongue stick to my palate
If I do not remember you,
If I do not place Jerusalem
Above my best joy.

7. Remember, O Lord,
Against the people of Edom
The day of Jerusalem;
Those who said, “Lay it bare,
Bare to its foundations!”

8. O city of Babylon,
Doomed for destruction –
Blest is he who treats you
As you have treated us.

9. Blest is he
Who takes and shatters your infants
Against the rock.

COMMUNAL PRAYER

Q. Why does prayer require a minyan?

A. Judaism believes in both individual and community prayer.

The definition of community for this purpose is ten, since the Torah (e.g. Gen. 42:45, Ex. 18:21, Num. 14:27) regards ten as the basic social unit.

The Mishnah (Megillah 4:3) lays down the prayers that require a minyan; they include Kaddish, K’dushah, Bar’chu and reading the Torah. All are deemed “d’varim shebik’dushah” – “passages (or prayers) of sanctification”.

The minyan rule has not only spiritual but social benefits in that it creates a sense of cohesiveness and community.

The sages assure us, however, that even without a minyan one is in the presence of God and a person may (and must if necessary) meditate and pray alone (Avot 3:6).

Rabbi Raymond Apple served for 32 years as the chief minister of the Great Synagogue, Sydney, Australia’s oldest and most prestigious congregation. He is now retired and lives in Jerusalem where he answers interesting questions.