The Four Children

Uncle Eli’s Haggadah is a Passover Haggadah written for children, described by one reader as in the style of ‘Dr.Seuss after four glasses of wine.’ The author, Eliezer Segal, holds a PhD in Talmud from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and serves as Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Calgary. The illustrator Bonnie Gordon-Lucas’ paintings appear on greeting cards, record album covers, clothing, in magazines, TV commercials, and four children’s books. If you have young children at your Seder, this is a great addition to help keep their attention.

“We have to get rid of the Hametz today, we have to destroy it, we can’t let it stay. We’ll punch it and crunch it and bury it deep, or leave it to rot on Mount Zeepleep-the- Steep.”

Concepts like ‘Hametz,’ ‘The Four Cups,’ ‘The Ten Plagues,’ and so forth are linked to texts which explain the different rituals and their meaning in a more serious fashion. Below is Uncle Eli’s version of the Four Sons. It appears to me to be 3 sons and a daughter.

To our seder last year came a strange-looking man with four sons:
Smarty, Nasty, and Simple, and Sam.
Now Smarty was smart—yes, so clever and wise.
He could do the whole seder while closing his eyes.
From beginning to end, from the end to the start,
He recited it over and over by heart.
In Hebrew and Hindu, in Snufic and Roman,
From the first Ha Lachma to the last Afikoman.

But Nasty refused to take part in the seder.
He just sat there and smiled with his pet alligator
As he pulled people’s hair and he poked people’s eyes
And sprinkled their matzah with beetles and flies.
What he needs is a thwack on the back of the hands,
Or a slap in the face or a kick in the pants.

Away in the corner sits sweet sister Simple.
Whenever she smiles her face breaks out in dimples.
She only asks about simple facts
Like “What’s a matzah?”
And “Tell me how tall is a Gloogasaurus Zax?”

And Sam doesn’t even know what to say.
He just sits in his box till the end of the day,
Till his Dad packs him up and takes him away.