| | 1 | By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. | |
| | 2 | There on the poplars we hung our harps, | |
| | 3 | for there our captors asked us for songs, our tormentors demanded songs of joy; they said, "Sing us one of the songs of Zion!" | |
| | 4 | How can we sing the songs of the LORD while in a foreign land? | |
| | 5 | If I forget you, O Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill. | |
| | 6 | May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you, if I do not consider Jerusalem my highest joy. | |
| | 7 | Remember, O LORD, what the Edomites did on the day Jerusalem fell. "Tear it down," they cried, "tear it down to its foundations!" | |
| | 8 | O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction, happy is he who repays you for what you have done to us-- | |
| | 9 | he who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks. | |
