No wry smile here

I was just about to write this for the Lenten theme when I noticed Clayboy's reference to the "wry smile" about the weirdness of religion on this site.
Which is ironic because there's no wry smile this morning.
Inspired by this from Ship of Fools, in turn h/t to Yewtree .
Three links and no story.  Not surprising.  Stalling.  Always stall when panicking.

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The reading is from Ps 137:9 and reads as follows:
           How blessed will be the one who seizes and dashes your little ones against the rock.
This is a line from the Psalms.  The Hymn Book of the people of Israel - and of good Protestants up to at least the 19th century.  Jesus's hymn book.  The "you" are the people of Babylon, whose children the psalmist wants to smash against a rock.  What on earth is going on here?


Two stereotypes: "Gentle Jesus Meek and Mild" or Dawkins's Mad God who kills people that hate him.  Dawks definitely appears to be on the side of the angels here, if you'll excuse the expression.


How can the Word of God recommend infanticide as a means of dealing with your enemies?  What are we supposed to do with this?


I guess there's a view that goes like this:
You're in a foreign country.  You've been thrown out of your native land.  Women have been raped by the invading armies.  The Royal Family has been murdered, or has gone over and collaborated.  Your prophet, Jeremiah, has headed off to Egypt with the real wallies.  You Temple is wrecked, the king of Babylon is using the Temple treasures as a tea set.  Maybe your family has been killed; or your son died in the battles around the City.  And you're asked to sing a song in a strange land.

It's 60 years now since the threat of an invasion of British soil.  It's 150 or so since the Americans last knew a war on their mainland (although I suspect members of the Native American and/or First Nations might disagree even with that).  The trouble our families suffered in World War II in Britain is mostly now a matter of distant memory.  What would we do?  How would you feel?  We - even in Britain, just 20 miles away from what was enemy-held territory - can't really remember.


You could be pious - you could mouth the words of peace while inside you seeth.  You could keep your peace through gritted teeth.  If God asked you what you thought you could say "bless them".


Or you could tell the truth. This is above all a true writing.  The writer  says what the writer feels.  Something that came from the heart.  And maybe in being written down and sung it was kind of sublimated from being a call to physical action.  I don't know.  But it's bloody honest.
You don't justify genocide.  The Jewish people above all know that.  But the Psalm is a human writing.  If they're anything, they're true to life.  The Psalms reflect the ups and downs, the loves and hates of real human beings and their real experiences.   Obviously, I'm not going to suggest murdering your enemies.  We don't do that these days - we destroy their reputations online instead.  But I've never lived through the experiences those Exiles knew and I'm not going to judge them on that basis.


But I am going to wonder - why did Ship of Fools readers, intelligent and charming to a man and woman as they are, decide this verse wasn't as bad as St Paul saying women shouldn't have authority over men?  Since when was sexism worse than infanticide?