FATE.
Lay me beside these still running waters
till the tears from the cloud rend my heart
piercing it asunder with lullabies of past bloodshed.
Lay me beside these still running waters
that I may behold the iniquities meeting at the
confluence of errors.
Lay me beside these still running waters
till the tears from the cloud rend my heart.
Wrap me tight like the fate of a dead man
squeeze me like the left-overs of a drop of foam
let my deeds journey with me along this silent street.
Wrap me tight like the fate of a dead man
mend my torn heart with threads of regret.
Wrap me tight like the fate of a dead man
squeeze me like the left-overs of a drop of foam.
Lay me beside these still running waters
till the tears from the cloud rend my heart
wrap me tight like the fate of a dead man
squeeze me like the left-overs of a drop of foam.
In 627 BCE Josiah (Yoshiyahu "healed by -- or supported of -- Yah") of Judah began to reverse the tolerant religious policies of his father Amon and grandfather Manasseh; in 622 BCE he ordered the refurbishing of the Temple of Jerusalem, leading to the rediscovery of the Book of Deuteronomy by the high priest Hilkiah. As a result, the king sent his scribe Shaphan and the scribe's son Ahikam to consult with the priestess Huldah. He then outlawed the worship of deities other than God, reinstituted Passover (Pesah), returned the Ark of the Covenant to the Temple and purged it of artifacts connected to the worship of Baal, destroyed corrupt local sanctuaries, and not only executed pagan priests but had dead ones exhumed and burned on their altars. He even extended his campaign beyond his own borders. Killed in 609 BCE trying to keepp Pharoah Necho II from crossing Judah en route against the Babylonians, he was succeeded by his son Shallum (Jehoahaz), whom Necho deposed three months later in favor of his older brother Eliakim, whose name he changed to Jehoiakim ("he whom Yahweh has set up"). The new king heavily taxed his people to pay the Egyptian tribute, while living incestuously with his mother, daughter-in-law, and stepmother. In 605 BCE Necho was defeated at Carchemish, the new Assyrian capital, by the Babylonian crown prince Nebuchadnezzar, who then besieged Jerusalem and forced Jehoiakim to pay tribute. A Babylonian invasion of Egypt failed in 601 BCE and Jehoiakim revolted. Nebuchadnezzar II, the new king of babylon, besieged Jerusalem again in late 598 BCE; Jehoiakim died and his people threw his corpse over the walls, and he was followed briefly by his son Jeconiah ("God will fortify [his people]"). But after a 3-month siege the Babylonians took the city, deposed the new king in favor of Jehoiakim's younger brother Mattanyahu (Tsidkiyyahu [Zedekiah}, "My righteousness is Yahweh"), and deported most of Judah's population to Babylon. Meanwhile, in 626 BC, Hilkah's son Yirmeyahu (Jeremiah) began to warn of the impending end of Judah in consequence of its sins. In response, he was attacked by his neighbors and his brothers, beaten and humiliated by a temple official, put under Ahikam's protective custody to save him from Jehoiakim, imprisoned by Zedekiah and threatened with death, and thrown into a cistern my royal officials to starve him to death without arousing popular dissent; he was rescued but reimprisoned until Nebuchadnezzar II conquered the kingdom and created a rump Jewish state at Mizpah, a cultic center in the former kingdom of Israel, under the governorship of Ahikanm's son Gedaliah. Four or five years later, at the behest of Baalis (Ba‘alyiša‘, ‘Baal is salvation’) the king of neighboring Ammon, Ishmael, a member of the former royal household, assassinated Gedaliah as a collaborator. He was succeeded by Johanan, who led the remaining Jews, including a reluctant Yirmeyahu, to Egypt, where he died. Yirmeyahu is credited as the author of the Books of Jeremiah, 1 and 2 Kings, and Lamentations, as well as Psalm 137:
ReplyDeleteBy the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept
when we remembered Zion.
There on the poplars
we hung our harps,
for there our captors asked us for songs,
our tormentors demanded songs of joy;
they said, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”
How can we sing the songs of the Lord
while in a foreign land?
If I forget you, Jerusalem,
may my right hand forget its skill.
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.
Remember, Lord, what the Edomites did
on the day Jerusalem fell.
“Tear it down,” they cried,
“tear it down to its foundations!”
Daughter Babylon, doomed to destruction,
happy is the one who repays you
according to what you have done to us.
Happy is the one who seizes your infants
and dashes them against the rocks.
[New International Version]