This is the script of this morning's Thought for the Day on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, written in the face of the horrors of Gaza, Syria, Ukraine and all the other bloody conflicts filling the news screens, and with a strict word limit.
Way back in 1978 Boney M did a terrible thing: they took a song of desperate lament and turned it into a disco dance hit. ‘By the rivers of Babylon’ was a boppy little number with a very catchy tune, but the music bore no relation to the content or the meaning of the words.
“By the rivers of Babylon we sat down and wept… How can we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?” This song – which is taken from Psalm 137 – is wrenched out of the guts of a people whose world has been lost – possibly for ever. Here they sit in exile, expelled from their homeland, being mocked by their captors while they weep in humiliation. After all, how can they sing songs of praise to their God when the evidence of their desperate experience tells them it has all been a big mistake?
Well, Boney M aren’t the only culprits when it comes to putting words to inappropriate music. But, this is the song that comes to my mind when I see the images brought to us from just about every corner of the globe by hugely brave journalists and film crews. Attempts to rationalize the immensity of human suffering in the world today must surely come second to some attempt at empathy. Our brains might be engaged, but our first response must be the surge of emotional horror and lament that is dragged from deep within us as we see the human suffering laid bare before us.
Now, Psalm 137 is not a comfortable song; nor is it a song for the comfortable. It ends with a shrill cry of pain and hatred: “God, I wish you’d take the children of my enemies and smash their heads against the rocks.” But, it isn’t there to justify an ethic. It isn’t there to suggest it is right to think such awful things of other people’s children. It is there for two reasons: first, to confront us with the reality of how deep our own human hatred can go, and, secondly, to tell us not to lie to God (thinking he can’t handle that reality or the depths of human despair).
If we thought the twentieth century of bloodshed and slaughter was bad enough, the twenty first is already proving pretty grim. Like everybody else, I have views on what is happening in the Middle East and closer to home in Ukraine – including the persecution of Christians in Iraq and elsewhere. And, having grown up in Liverpool in the aftermath of the Second World War with grandparents who well remembered the First, I am haunted by the human propensity for what historian Christopher Clark has called the “sleepwalking” into global conflict. Where does all this leave the myth of human progress?
“By the rivers of Babylon” perhaps gives us a vocabulary for times such as this – admitting the horror and the helplessness, but surrounded by other songs that compel compassionate response and action that is rooted in hope of a better future.
This last sentence is a reference to the fact that the prophets of the Hebrew Scriptures tackle the hard task of imagining a future where one looks impossible.
July 31, 2014 at 9:16 am
I heard you this morning on Radio 4 and it reminded me of Ecclesiastes 1
9 The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.
10 Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us.
11 There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after.
July 31, 2014 at 9:56 am
Thank you, Bishop Nick.
July 31, 2014 at 3:29 pm
Can’t get rid of that wretched song since I heard you on the radio in bed this morning!!! And even Jonathan Dove’s world premier piece from the Proms at 2pm didn’t do it either 🙂 Time for Gerry & the Pacemakers I think …
July 31, 2014 at 4:06 pm
My humour is not to take away from the true essence of what you have to say. It’s all heart breaking to see these images, and people do wonder where God is in all of this. Similar to you in Liverpool, I was brought up in the East End of London – in Bow where so much simply got bombed to smithereens, including the house my Irish parents moved into before I was born and where I spent my childhood. Your thoughts seem more clear than mine over all of this. Thank you!
August 1, 2014 at 10:48 am
I do not understand how this verse is ‘telling us not to lie to God (thinking he can’t handle that reality or the depths of human despair)’. Would it be possible to have another blog post explaining this? Thanks.
August 1, 2014 at 7:05 pm
Way back in 1978 Boney M did a terrible thing
Truly, the Germans have a lot to answer for… 🙂
August 2, 2014 at 4:22 pm
Before Boney M, there was Don MacLean. His version was far more authentic, sung by the audience as a round in Birmingham Town Hall in 1972, the year of the third Arab/Israeli War, the B’ham pub bombings and the release of American Pie/Vincent. Pretty grim times they were all round. We have been through hopeless times before, when it was easier to look back than forwards. The early eighties were a case in point, but then, in 1988/9, a whole flock of swallows suddenly landed.
August 4, 2014 at 3:12 pm
I had Don MacLean in my original script, but had to edit him out! His version was in a minor key – never quite resolves – so fitted the words.
August 5, 2014 at 5:42 pm
Thanks, Nick. Also heard Tom Paxton (Peace Will Come), another roundel and Ralph McTell, all within a few months. Then it was Lonesome Stone and Greenbelt in 1974. Went back last year for the fortieth, feeling my age! At least Graham Kendrick is always Graham Kendrick!
August 8, 2014 at 9:54 pm
Reblogged this on Michael Moore's Blog and commented:
If you aren’t following him, join this Padre in becoming a new follower 🙂
August 12, 2014 at 4:21 pm
[…] the logic of war is not far from us all in our reactions and attitudes. Often as Bishop Nick Baines put it recently, we find ourselves besides the rivers of Babylon and weep, but also rage against our enemies. Or in […]
March 31, 2015 at 2:47 pm
[…] For The Day’ on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. He tells us on his blog – Musings of a Restless Bishop – that it was “written in the face of the horrors of Gaza, Syria, Ukraine and all the […]