1. …But to-day we have sung, “By the waters of Babylon we sat down and wept, when we remembered Sion” (ver. 1).…
2. Observe “the waters of Babylon.” “The waters of Babylon” are all things which here are loved, and pass away. One man, for example, loveth to practise husbandry, to grow rich thereby, to employ his mind therein, thence to gain pleasure: let him observe the issue, and see that what he hath loved is not a foundation of Jerusalem, but a stream of Babylon. Another saith, It is a grand thing to be a soldier: all husbandmen fear those who are soldiers.…
3. But then other citizens of the holy Jerusalem, understanding their captivity, mark how the natural wishes and the various lusts of men hurry and drag them hither and thither, and drive them into the sea; they see this, and they throw not themselves into the waters of Babylon, but “sit down and weep,” either for those who are being carried away by them, or themselves whose deserts have placed them in Babylon, but sitting, that is, humbling themselves. O holy Sion, where all stands firm and nothing flows! Who hath thrown us headlong into this? Why have we left thy Founder and thy society? Behold, placed where all things are flowing and gliding away, scarce one, if he can grasp the tree, shall be snatched from the stream and escape. Humbling ourselves then in our captivity, let us “sit by the waters of Babylon,” let us not dare to plunge ourselves in those streams, nor to be proud and lifted up in the evil and sadness of our captivity, but let us sit, and so weep. Let us sit “by” the waters, not beneath the waters, of Babylon; such be our humility, that it overwhelm us not. Sit “by” the waters, not “in” the waters, not “under” the waters; but yet sit, in humble fashion, talk not as thou wouldest in Jerusalem.…
4. For many weep with the weeping of Babylon, because they rejoice also with the joy of Babylon. When men rejoice at gains and weep at losses, both are of Babylon. Thou oughtest to weep, but in the remembrance of Sion. If thou weepest in the remembrance of Sion, thou oughtest to weep even when it is well with thee in Babylon.…
5. “On the willows in the midst thereof we hung up our instruments of music” (ver. 2). The citizens of Jerusalem have their “instruments of music,” God’s Scriptures, God’s commands, God’s promises, meditation on the life to come; but while they are dwelling “in Babylon,” they “hang up their instruments.” Willows are unfruitful trees, and here so placed, that no good whatever can be understood of them: elsewhere perhaps there may. Here understand barren trees, growing by the waters of Babylon. These trees are watered by the waters of Babylon, and bring forth no fruit; just as there are men greedy, covetous, barren in good works, citizens of Babylon in such wise, that they are even trees of that region; they are fed there by these pleasures of transitory things, as though watered by “the waters of Babylon.” Thou seekest fruit of them, and nowhere findest it.…Therefore by deferring to apply the Scriptures to them, “we hang up our instruments of music upon the willows.” For we hold them not worthy to carry our instruments. We do not therefore insert our instruments into them and bind them to them, but defer to use them, and so hang them up. For the willows are the unfruitful trees of Babylon, fed by temporal pleasures, as by the “waters of Babylon.”
6. “For there they that led us captive demanded of us words of songs, and they that led us away, an hymn” (ver. 3). They demanded of us words of songs and an hymn, who led us captive.…We are tempted by the delights of earthly things, and we struggle daily with the suggestions of unlawful pleasures; scarce do we breathe freely even in prayer: we understand that we are captives. But who led us captive? what men? what race? what king? If we are redeemed, we once were captives. Who hath redeemed us? Christ. From whom hath He redeemed us? From the devil. The devil then and his angels led us captive: and they would not lead us, unless we consented.…