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Happy Passover!
(To them what do it)
April 11 in 1998
(1st day is today, 2nd Seder is tonight)
One of the traditional songs for Passover is "Chad Gadya." It's a progressive or
cumulative song. The theology is strongly laid out in that it progresses from the
low, a kid, on up to the highest, God. Compare to cyclical songs as "The Everlasting
Circle" or to simple counting songs.
Then came the Holy One, Blessed be he,
And destroyed the Angel of Death,
That killed the butcher,
That slew the ox
That drank the water,
That quenched the fire,
That burned the stick,
That beat the dog,
That bit the cat,
That ate the kid
My father bought for two zuzim,
Chad gadya, chad gadya (An only kid, an only kid)
We are fortunate to have some as yet unpublished notes from eminent Folklorist &
scholar Norm Cohen (Long Steel Rail). "Chad Gadya" first appeared in the Prague
Haggadah of 1590. It was written in poor Aramaic with a scattering of Hebrew words,
probably no earlier than the 15th century, according to Glatzer. The music was first
published in 1677 and there is a Folkways record with 25 different versions.
Cohen notes that "Chad Gadya" has not escaped the notice of folklorists and especially
English ones. It is mentioned in The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes and by the
Opies. They remark on its similarity to "The House that Jack Built."
Note another Passover song, "Echad Mi Yodea" (Who Knows One) which has often
(even in *.music.folk) been noted for its resemblance to "Green Grow the Rushes, O."
It also first appeared in the Prague Haggadah of 1590 (but not the 1526 one.)
Many religious & mystical interpretations have been foisted on both songs - mostly
unsupported - but the folk/doctrinal core nature is clear.
© Abby Sale - all rights reserved
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