Whenever someone tries to tell me that Islam, unlike Christianity, is a religion of hatred and violence, I reply with two words: Psalm 137. 2 There on the poplars 3 for there our captors asked us for songs, 4 How can we sing the songs of the LORD 9 he who seizes your infants Look at the verse; Look at the verse; Look at verse nine: [rising voice] "Happy shall they be who take your little ones and dash them against the rocks."[lower voice] The people of faith are the rivers of Babylon. How shall we sing the Lord's song? If I forget the order ... The people of faith, have moved from the hatred of armed enemies [rising voice]--these soldiers who captured the king; those soldiers who slaughtered his son, that put his eyes out; those soldiers who sacked the city, burned, burned the towns, the burned the temple, burned the towers, they have moved from the hatred of [loudest voice] armed enemies to the hatred of unarmed innocents -- [low voice] the babies, the babies. Blessed are they who dash your baby’s brains against a rock. And that, my beloved, is a dangerous place to be, yet that is where the people of faith are in the 551BC, and that is where far too many people of faith are in 2001 AD. We have moved from the hatred of armed enemies to the hatred of unarmed innocents. We want revenge, we want paybacks, and we don't care who gets hurt in the process. Now I asked the Lord, what should our response be in light of such an unthinkable act, but before I share with you what the Lord shared with me I want to give you one of my little faith footnotes. Visitors, I often give little faith footnotes, so that our members don't lose sight of the big picture, let me give you a faith footnote. Turn to your neighbor and say, "Faith footnote." [Voices: "Faith footnote"] [Begin faith footnote] I heard Ambassador Peck on an interview yesterday. Did anybody else see him or hear him, he was on Fox News. This is a white man, and he was upsetting the Fox News commentators to no end. He pointed out, (Did you see him, John?) --a white man-- he pointed out-- an ambassador-- that what Malcolm X said when he got silenced by Elijah Mohammad was in fact true, America's chickens are coming home to roost. We took this country, by terror, away from the Sioux, the Apache, the Arrowak (phonetic) the Comanche, the Arapajo, the Navajo. Terrorism--we took Africans from their country to build our way of ease and kept them enslaved and living in fear. Terrorism. We bombed Grenada and killed innocent civilians -- babies, non-military personnel. We bombed the black civilian community of Panama with Stealth Bombers and killed unarmed teenagers, and toddlers, pregnant mothers and hard working father. [fullest voice] We bombed Khadafi, his home and killed his child. Blessed be they who bash your children's head agains the rocks. [fullest voice] We bombed Iraq, we killed unarmed civilians trying to make a living. We bombed the plant in Sudan to payback for the attack on our embassy -- killed hundreds of hard working people --mothers and fathers, who left home to go that day, not knowing they'd never get back home. [Even fuller voice] We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon and we never batted an eye. Kids playing in the playground, mothers picking up children after school -- civilians not soldiers. People just trying to make it day by day. We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and South Africa and now we are indignant? Because the stuff we have done overseas is brought back into our own front yard. America's chickens are coming home, to roost. Violence begets violence. Hatred begets hatred, and terrorism begets terrorism. [lower voice] A White ambassador said that, y'all, not a black militant. Not a Reverend who preaches about racism, an ambassador whose eyes are wide open, and whose trying to get us to wake up, and move away from this dangerous precipice upon which we are now poised. The ambassador said that the people we have wounded don't have the military capability we have, but they do have individuals who are willing to die and take thousands with them, and we need to come to grips with that. Let me stop my faith footnote right there, and ask you to think about that over the next few weeks if God grants us that many days. Turn back to your neighbor, and say, "Footnote is over." [Voices: "Footnote is over."] [End Faith Footnote] [Gentle voice] Now, now. C'mon back to my question to the Lord, "What should our response be right now. In light of such an unthinkable act. I asked the Lord that question Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. I was stuck in Newark, New Jersey. No flights were leaving La Guardia, JFK, or Newark Airport. On the day tht the FAA opened up the airports to bring into the destinations of cities those flights that had been diverted because of the hijacking, a scare in New York close all three regional airports and I couldn't even get her for Mr. Radford's father's funeral. And I asked God, "What should our response be? I saw pictures of the incredible. People jumping from the 110th floor; people jumping from the roof because the stair wells and elevators above the 89th floor were gone-- no more. Black people, jumping to a certain death; people holding hands jumping; people on fire jumping. [plaintiff high voice] And I asked the Lord, "What should our response be?" I read what the people of faith felt in 551BC. But this is a different time, this is a different enemy, a different world, a different terror. This is a different reality. What should our response be, and the Lord showed me three things. Let me share them with you quickly and I'm gonna leave you alone to think about the faith footnote. Number one: The Lord showed me that this is a time for self-examination. [cheers] As I sat 900 miles away from my family and my community of faith, two months after my own father's death, God showed me that this was a time for me to examine my relationship with God. MY own relationship with God-- personal relationship with God. I submit to you that it is the same for you. Folk flocked to the church in New Jersey last week, you know that foxhole-religion syndrome kicked in, that emergency chord religion, you know that little red box you pull in emergency? It showed up in full force. Folk who aint thought about coming to church in years, were in church last week. I heard that mid-week prayer services all over this country which are poorly attended fifty-one week a year were jam packed all over the nation the week of the hijacking the 52nd week. [inaudible] But the Lord said, this aint [sic] the time for you to be examining other folks relationship this is a time of self examination. But the Lord said, "How is "our" relationship doing Jeremiah? How often do you talked to me personally, how often do you let me talk to you privately? How much time do you spend trying to get right with me, or do you spend all your time trying to get other folk right? This is a time for me to examine my own relationship with God. Is it real or is it fake? Is it forever or is it for show? Is is something that you do for the sake of the public or is it something that you do for the sake of eternity? [voice rising] This is a time for me to examine my own, and a time for you to examine your own relationship with God -- self examination.
You may never have heard Psalm 137; it's no 1 Corinthians 13 or John 3:16. No, Psalm 137 is a much more difficult text. It is, you see, a cry of revenge.
It begins with a lamentation of those enslaved.1 By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept
It ends with a demand for vengeance against the innocent.
when we remembered Zion.
we hung our harps,
our tormentors demanded songs of joy;
they said, "Sing us one of the songs of Zion!"
while in a foreign land? 8 O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction,
It is an understandable emotion for a slave to feel, or one who has been terribly wronged. Evil, twisted, wrong -- but understandable. You have hurt me and my people, my children, and so I shall hurt you and your people, and your children, I will slaughter your babes as you slaughtered mine. It is the very definition of the cycle of violence.
happy is he who repays you
for what you have done to us-
and dashes them against the rocks.
There are not many mainline ministers who would ever bring up Psalm 137 to their congregations; it is orthogonal to the message most ministers like to ascribe to Christianity. Those few who would bring up that Psalm and engage with it would certainly pick some calmer time than now to do it. They certainly wouldn't have done so after the attacks on America on September 11, 2001.
Except one minister did, and did so to state specifically that the cycle of violence is not something that just happens to other people. He did so to challenge his congregation to see that they were a part of the cycle, that they supported the cycle no less than the Semites exiled in the sixth century B.C.E.
That minister was Rev. Jeremiah Wright, of Trinity U.C.C. in Chicago, Illinois.
You've heard part of that sermon, the "chickens coming home to roost" part. But that's lacking in context. Andrew Sullivan has helpfully provided the full text of the sermon. It is much different, and much fuller, than the caricature you have been shown.
That is not to say that it is all comfortable, or all correct. I disagree with parts of it, and would have disagreed far more strenuously on September 16, 2001. But Wright's job was not to win votes or a popularity contest -- it was to challenge his flock to be more moral, more righteous, than they were. In Matthew 5:39, Jesus exhorts his followers, "Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." That is far more than most people can muster, and yet Jesus did not give a "bad guy" exception to this rule. He did not say, "And then, sucker-punch the jerk." Jesus said, simply, if you are attacked, then take it.
This is not a message I agree with, at least not wholeheartedly, and it is not one that most Americans agree with, whatever the professed number of Christians is in this land. But it is what Jesus taught, and it is in that spirit that Wright spoke. I'm not going to cut and paste; I'll quote the whole thing, and just emphasize a few points in bold.
You can disagree with Wright's timing, or his phrasing. But you can't disagree with his facts. The land I sit on as I write this was stolen from the Lakota. America has unquestionably killed innocent civilians in war, and while the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and Dresden may have been necessary to prevent even more horrific destruction, our actions there were not morally clean. Slavery and Jim Crow are a stain on our nation's soul. And we have only added to this litany in the six-and-a-half years since these words were spoken. How many Iraqi civilians have died because our nation's leaders refused to engage in self-examination, refused to question their desire for vengeance? How many enemies have we made in our rush to strike out against someone -- anyone -- to make whole our country?
Wright's sermon that September Sunday was a challenge to his congregation, one that more of us should have engaged. It is easy to look at the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and think that if only one side or the other could just stop killing, it could stop the whole cycle of killing and revenge killing and revenge killing and revenge killing and so on and so forth, ad infinitum. It is easy to look at others and see the motes in their eyes. It is far harder to look at the planks in our own eyes, our own country's failures, our own mistakes, our own part in the cycle of violence.
I am not a pacifist. Unlike Jesus, I believe there are times when you must stand up to your enemies. But the events of the past seven years have convinced me that the decision to turn the other cheek or level an even blow must be made with prudence and judgment, with grave and exacting awareness of what both courses of action entail. You can criticize Wright's choice of words, or his choice of examples. But it seems to me that is what he was saying on September 16, 2001, and I don't know how anyone could think, six-and-a-half years later, that he was wrong.
You may never have heard Psalm 137; it's no 1 Corinthians 13 or John 3:16. No, Psalm 137 is a much more difficult text. It is, you see, a cry of revenge.
It begins with a lamentation of those enslaved.
1 By the rivers of Babylon we sat and weptIt ends with a demand for vengeance against the innocent.
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?
8 O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction,It is an understandable emotion for a slave to feel, or one who has been terribly wronged. Evil, twisted, wrong -- but understandable. You have hurt me and my people, my children, and so I shall hurt you and your people, and your children, I will slaughter your babes as you slaughtered mine. It is the very definition of the cycle of violence.
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.
There are not many mainline ministers who would ever bring up Psalm 137 to their congregations; it is orthogonal to the message most ministers like to ascribe to Christianity. Those few who would bring up that Psalm and engage with it would certainly pick some calmer time than now to do it. They certainly wouldn't have done so after the attacks on America on September 11, 2001.
Except one minister did, and did so to state specifically that the cycle of violence is not something that just happens to other people. He did so to challenge his congregation to see that they were a part of the cycle, that they supported the cycle no less than the Semites exiled in the sixth century B.C.E.
That minister was Rev. Jeremiah Wright, of Trinity U.C.C. in Chicago, Illinois.
You've heard part of that sermon, the "chickens coming home to roost" part. But that's lacking in context. Andrew Sullivan has helpfully provided the full text of the sermon. It is much different, and much fuller, than the caricature you have been shown.
That is not to say that it is all comfortable, or all correct. I disagree with parts of it, and would have disagreed far more strenuously on September 16, 2001. But Wright's job was not to win votes or a popularity contest -- it was to challenge his flock to be more moral, more righteous, than they were. In Matthew 5:39, Jesus exhorts his followers, "Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." That is far more than most people can muster, and yet Jesus did not give a "bad guy" exception to this rule. He did not say, "And then, sucker-punch the jerk." Jesus said, simply, if you are attacked, then take it.
This is not a message I agree with, at least not wholeheartedly, and it is not one that most Americans agree with, whatever the professed number of Christians is in this land. But it is what Jesus taught, and it is in that spirit that Wright spoke. I'm not going to cut and paste; I'll quote the whole thing, and just emphasize a few points in bold.
You can disagree with Wright's timing, or his phrasing. But you can't disagree with his facts. The land I sit on as I write this was stolen from the Lakota. America has unquestionably killed innocent civilians in war, and while the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and Dresden may have been necessary to prevent even more horrific destruction, our actions there were not morally clean. Slavery and Jim Crow are a stain on our nation's soul. And we have only added to this litany in the six-and-a-half years since these words were spoken. How many Iraqi civilians have died because our nation's leaders refused to engage in self-examination, refused to question their desire for vengeance? How many enemies have we made in our rush to strike out against someone -- anyone -- to make whole our country?Look at the verse; Look at the verse; Look at verse nine: [rising voice] "Happy shall they be who take your little ones and dash them against the rocks."[lower voice] The people of faith are the rivers of Babylon. How shall we sing the Lord's song? If I forget the order ... The people of faith, have moved from the hatred of armed enemies [rising voice]--these soldiers who captured the king; those soldiers who slaughtered his son, that put his eyes out; those soldiers who sacked the city, burned, burned the towns, the burned the temple, burned the towers, they have moved from the hatred of [loudest voice] armed enemies to the hatred of unarmed innocents -- [low voice] the babies, the babies.
Blessed are they who dash your baby’s brains against a rock. And that, my beloved, is a dangerous place to be, yet that is where the people of faith are in the 551BC, and that is where far too many people of faith are in 2001 AD. We have moved from the hatred of armed enemies to the hatred of unarmed innocents. We want revenge, we want paybacks, and we don't care who gets hurt in the process.
Now I asked the Lord, what should our response be in light of such an unthinkable act, but before I share with you what the Lord shared with me I want to give you one of my little faith footnotes.
Visitors, I often give little faith footnotes, so that our members don't lose sight of the big picture, let me give you a faith footnote. Turn to your neighbor and say, "Faith footnote." [Voices: "Faith footnote"]
[Begin faith footnote]
I heard Ambassador Peck on an interview yesterday. Did anybody else see him or hear him, he was on Fox News. This is a white man, and he was upsetting the Fox News commentators to no end. He pointed out, (Did you see him, John?) --a white man-- he pointed out-- an ambassador-- that what Malcolm X said when he got silenced by Elijah Mohammad was in fact true, America's chickens are coming home to roost.
We took this country, by terror, away from the Sioux, the Apache, the Arrowak (phonetic) the Comanche, the Arapajo, the Navajo. Terrorism--we took Africans from their country to build our way of ease and kept them enslaved and living in fear. Terrorism. We bombed Grenada and killed innocent civilians -- babies, non-military personnel. We bombed the black civilian community of Panama with Stealth Bombers and killed unarmed teenagers, and toddlers, pregnant mothers and hard working father. [fullest voice] We bombed Khadafi, his home and killed his child. Blessed be they who bash your children's head agains the rocks.
[fullest voice] We bombed Iraq, we killed unarmed civilians trying to make a living. We bombed the plant in Sudan to payback for the attack on our embassy -- killed hundreds of hard working people --mothers and fathers, who left home to go that day, not knowing they'd never get back home. [Even fuller voice] We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon and we never batted an eye. Kids playing in the playground, mothers picking up children after school -- civilians not soldiers. People just trying to make it day by day. We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and South Africa and now we are indignant? Because the stuff we have done overseas is brought back into our own front yard.
America's chickens are coming home, to roost. Violence begets violence. Hatred begets hatred, and terrorism begets terrorism.
[lower voice] A White ambassador said that, y'all, not a black militant. Not a Reverend who preaches about racism, an ambassador whose eyes are wide open, and whose trying to get us to wake up, and move away from this dangerous precipice upon which we are now poised. The ambassador said that the people we have wounded don't have the military capability we have, but they do have individuals who are willing to die and take thousands with them, and we need to come to grips with that.
Let me stop my faith footnote right there, and ask you to think about that over the next few weeks if God grants us that many days. Turn back to your neighbor, and say, "Footnote is over." [Voices: "Footnote is over."]
[End Faith Footnote]
[Gentle voice] Now, now. C'mon back to my question to the Lord, "What should our response be right now. In light of such an unthinkable act. I asked the Lord that question Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.
I was stuck in Newark, New Jersey. No flights were leaving La Guardia, JFK, or Newark Airport. On the day tht the FAA opened up the airports to bring into the destinations of cities those flights that had been diverted because of the hijacking, a scare in New York close all three regional airports and I couldn't even get her for Mr. Radford's father's funeral. And I asked God, "What should our response be?
I saw pictures of the incredible. People jumping from the 110th floor; people jumping from the roof because the stair wells and elevators above the 89th floor were gone-- no more. Black people, jumping to a certain death; people holding hands jumping; people on fire jumping. [plaintiff high voice] And I asked the Lord, "What should our response be?" I read what the people of faith felt in 551BC. But this is a different time, this is a different enemy, a different world, a different terror. This is a different reality. What should our response be, and the Lord showed me three things. Let me share them with you quickly and I'm gonna leave you alone to think about the faith footnote.
Number one: The Lord showed me that this is a time for self-examination. [cheers] As I sat 900 miles away from my family and my community of faith, two months after my own father's death, God showed me that this was a time for me to examine my relationship with God. MY own relationship with God-- personal relationship with God.
I submit to you that it is the same for you. Folk flocked to the church in New Jersey last week, you know that foxhole-religion syndrome kicked in, that emergency chord religion, you know that little red box you pull in emergency? It showed up in full force. Folk who aint thought about coming to church in years, were in church last week. I heard that mid-week prayer services all over this country which are poorly attended fifty-one week a year were jam packed all over the nation the week of the hijacking the 52nd week. [inaudible]
But the Lord said, this aint [sic] the time for you to be examining other folks relationship this is a time of self examination. But the Lord said, "How is "our" relationship doing Jeremiah? How often do you talked to me personally, how often do you let me talk to you privately? How much time do you spend trying to get right with me, or do you spend all your time trying to get other folk right?
This is a time for me to examine my own relationship with God. Is it real or is it fake? Is it forever or is it for show? Is is something that you do for the sake of the public or is it something that you do for the sake of eternity? [voice rising] This is a time for me to examine my own, and a time for you to examine your own relationship with God -- self examination.
Wright's sermon that September Sunday was a challenge to his congregation, one that more of us should have engaged. It is easy to look at the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and think that if only one side or the other could just stop killing, it could stop the whole cycle of killing and revenge killing and revenge killing and revenge killing and so on and so forth, ad infinitum. It is easy to look at others and see the motes in their eyes. It is far harder to look at the planks in our own eyes, our own country's failures, our own mistakes, our own part in the cycle of violence.
I am not a pacifist. Unlike Jesus, I believe there are times when you must stand up to your enemies. But the events of the past seven years have convinced me that the decision to turn the other cheek or level an even blow must be made with prudence and judgment, with grave and exacting awareness of what both courses of action entail. You can criticize Wright's choice of words, or his choice of examples. But it seems to me that is what he was saying on September 16, 2001, and I don't know how anyone could think, six-and-a-half years later, that he was wrong.
