At our wedding this summer, we used a surf rock version of this song done by Dick Dale and the Del-tones as our recessional. It lends itself very well to the Dick Dale style. 
According to Mel Brooks’ take on world history, in the agoras of Ancient Rome, it was soft-shuffled by uncircumcised Jewish Ethiopian slaves from 125th Street.
[d&r]
Well, as “Joe Pesci” said once on SNL, “To all my Hebwew fwends out dere, have a nagila on me!”
Every entry-level bar-band gigger is required to know this song. I bet even Kurt Kobain knew it. Also required is, You Picked A Fine Time To Leave Me, Lucille, and, in case they play a union-hall gig, Molly Garrity Forever. 
I always heard these lines as:
Put it aquí, molest the mailman,
Put it aquí, molest the mailman,
Put it aquí, molest the mailman!
The literal English translation is more like:
Let’s be happy,
Let’s be happy,
Let’s be happy,
And let’s rejoice.
Let’s be happy,
Let’s be happy,
Let’s be happy,
And let’s rejoice.
Let’s be happy,
Let’s be happy,
Let’s be happy,
And let’s rejoice.
Let’s be happy,
Let’s be happy,
Let’s be happy,
And let’s rejoice.
Arise, arise, arise arise arise arise,
Arise, brothers, with a happy heart,
Arise, brothers, with a happy heart,
Arise, brothers, with a happy heart,
Arise, brothers, with a happy heart,
Arise, brothers, arise brothers, with a happy heart!
(Irving Berlin it ain’t.)
I must have had to learn to sing this like ten times in school, primary and high. But nobody ever bothered to translate it. Thanks.
Ah, a chance for me to feel smug(ish). Wow - methinks this century is better than the last one! What a terrific century this is!
For some reason I have known this tune since very young (zero exposure to Judaic culture, though). Ithink it might have been from those "Sing songs from around the world " type thingies we had in primary shcool, wherein I think they pcked songs pretty much for being well known/lowest common denominator/whatever of their nationality, e.g Russia = full of Volga chaps chucking wives out of boats, etc.
Not the song itself being form the silly primary school thing, of course - oops, perhaps they should have taught me to write instead. (Re. wrting, the above mess very nearly referred to women being thrown out of “boas”, rather than boats, which makes for an amusing, less lethal, picture.)
If the lyrics are supposed to be this uplifting, then why the heck is the song in a minor key?!
It’s like the opposite of Steve Martin singing “Oh death, and grief, and sorrow, and murder” on his banjo.
I’m not Jewish, but “Hava Nagila” is my ringtone. (I have Motorola, by the way, not Nokia.) It’s convenient because I’ve never heard another person’s phone ring that way, so I always know it’s mine.
Here are a couple of links describing the background of the song:
The song is usually accompanied by a circle dance called a hora, which is quite lively.
I heard about an ethnomusicologist who conducted a study among Israeli children. . . he played them several pieces of music, some in major keys and some in minor. When asked, they all replied that the minor keys “sounded happier.”
And it should be noted that “brothers” in the translation is also used as the word to mean “sisters and brothers.”
Ah, the wonders of collective psychology. ;j