Chad ga ya

This is a fun traditional Passover song that takes about four hours to sing correctly...

  • One little goat, one little goat
  • That my father bought for two zuzim
  • The retail price is three zuzim
  • My father gets a discount because he buys a lot of goats
  • along came a cat and ate the goat

Which sounds ridiculous until you realize that this song is an allegory about the history of Israel, with the cat symbolizing Assyria.

  • along came a dog, symbolizing Babylonia, which bit the cat
  • Guess where it bit the cat?
  • On its ASS(yria)!
  • Then along came a stick
  • Apparently, it was a walking stick
  • Stop it!  We are killing ourselves with this word play!!
  • Anyway, the stick symbolized Persia by hitting the dog
  • Along came a fire, aka Greece, and burned the stick
  • Along came water in the form of Rome and put out the fire
  • along came an ox symbolizing the Saracens

Which according to Wikipedia, is either an early Arab tribe, or an English professional reugby team.  Whoever they were, they drank the water

  • Along came a butcher, symbolizing the Crusaders, and killed the ox
  • along came the Angel of Death, symbolizing the Ottomans - which sounds like a horde of lethal footstools, right? and killed the butcher
  • Along came the Holy One, symbolizing the Holy One, and slew the Angel of Death
  • And a partridge in a pear tree

haggadah Section: Songs