Marching from Goshen, an adaptation of “Marching through Georgia” for the Passover seder by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer

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31 March 2026 under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) 4.0 International copyleft license

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English vernacular prayer, Freedom, haggadah supplements, Jewish liberation, liberation, liberation from mitsrayim, Slaveholders' Rebellion (1861-1865), זמירות zemirot

This is a Passover adaptation of “Marching through Georgia” (1865) by Henry Clay Work (1832-1884). “Marching through Georgia” is a somewhat controversial song for two reasons, one of them valid, the other (in my opinion) not as much. The valid problem: the second verse of the original text features a racial slur. When people sing it now we skip or replace that line. The less valid problem: pity for the poor Confederate plantation owners whose homes were destroyed by Sherman’s forces. I frankly do not care about the suffering of slavers in a slave state. I shed no tears for the monsters who enforced the inhuman system of chattel slavery, and I treat their homes’ destruction as the just deserts of their sin in owning human beings as property.

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	Break me off some matzo, boys! We’ll sing another song. Singing out the hallel, our redemption came along. Sing it as we used to sing, six hundred thousand strong, While we were marching from Goshen.
	Chorus: “Hurrah! Hurrah! We bring the Jubilee! Hurrah! Hurrah! For God has made us free!” So we sang the chorus from Migdol to the Reed Sea, While we were marching from Goshen
	How Israel shouted when they heard the joyful sound. How the cloud and fire pillars led us Canaan-bound. How we raised a holler when the slaver armies drowned, While we were marching from Goshen. (Chorus)
	Along with the mixed multitude, we wept with joyful tears, When we tasted freedom after hundreds of long years; Hardly could we stop ourselves from breaking forth in cheers, While we were marching from Goshen. (Chorus)
	“In the desert they’ll be stuck, the land’ll close ’em in!” So said Pharaoh and his men, but much to their chagrin, They forgot to reckon with the God that made us win, While we were marching from Goshen. (Chorus)
	So we made a thoroughfare for freedom and her train, Egypt’s troops and chariots in myriads were slain, As we saw it, we proclaimed our God‘s eternal reign, While we were marching from Goshen. (Chorus)

Isaac Gantwerk Mayer

From a family of musicians, Isaac Gantwerk Mayer believes that creative art is one of the most powerful ways to get in touch with the divine. He composes music and poetry in Hebrew and English. (He also translates and transcribes Hebrew and Aramaic texts, adding niqqud and t'amim as needed.) Isaac runs a Jewish music transcription service, which will transcribe and set any Jewish music in any language, recorded or written. Contact his service on Facebook or via his music blog.

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The Israelites Leaving Egypt (ca. 1830) by David Roberts

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ויהי נעם אדני אלהינו עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננה עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננהו׃ (תהלים צ:יז) · "May the pleasantness of אדֹני our elo’ah be upon us; may our handiwork be established for us — our handiwork, may it be established." (Psalms 90:17)

Marching from Goshen, an adaptation of “Marching through Georgia” for the Passover seder by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer

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