Mentions of Lilith - Adam's first wife
Lilith, as the first wife of Adam, was first mentioned in several Christian apocrypha - books written in biblical Old Testament times or during the life and after the death of Jesus, which were not accepted by the official church as worthy of attention and generally accepted sources. Until now, neither Judaism, nor Christianity, nor Islam consider the fact of the existence of Lilith to correspond to the canons of faith.
The essence of Lilith was actively documented in early Semitic myths, where the woman was the patroness of the evil spirits of the night. The demon destroyed women and small children and seduced men. More details about powers and status are written in the article about the demoness Lilith.
The image of the first woman is revealed most profoundly in Kabbalah. According to mystical Jewish teaching, Lilith symbolizes the negative feminine principle, just as Cain symbolizes the anti-male principle, and the demon Samael symbolizes the anti-divine. Adam's first wife is considered the embodiment of all hellish demons and their queen.
Judaism does not reject Kabbalah, but considers it a continuation of the religious and scientific tradition of the Jewish people. The first woman, created from clay, has the right to exist along with other demons and angels.
Lilith - a beautiful demoness
The origin of the image and name of Lilith is not known for certain, but researchers have several versions regarding this. Presumably, the prototype of Lilith could be the designation of the air gods in Sumerian mythology (in the ancient dialect “lil” meant “wind”, “ghost”).
The name Lilith acquires a similar meaning in the texts of the Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible, where “lilit” is translated as “ghost of the night.” According to many scientists who have studied Sumerian writings and legends, the name Lilith can combine the words “lil” and “lilu”, meaning darkness and vision.
In fact, despite some differences in interpretation, we get a very dark image. In addition, I will add that in Jewish myths the word “lilit” is used as a common noun to describe the characteristics of demonesses.
The oldest archaeological finds directly related to Lilith were bowls discovered in Nippur, a Babylonian city. These items are completely covered with texts.
As the researchers found out, the words represent various spells used as protection against demons. I think the bowls themselves could have been a kind of amulet. Interestingly, the texts speak of Lilith as a dark entity capable of possessing the soul of a man.
Lilith poses a particular danger to women during childbirth and newborn children. The cups indicate that people who are most vulnerable to the demoness should be protected from Lilith's magic.
John Collier. Lilith
Adam and Lilith - the story of their life together
Lilith, according to the apocrypha, was created by God along with Adam. Simple clay was used to create women. By right of creation, people were equal, but God gave the first woman for Adam's use. The couple was together for a long time: the time frame for people’s stay in the Garden of Eden is not indicated in Scripture.
According to a legend popular among feminists, Lilith was a kind wife and sought to live up to her husband, but she was disgusted by the idea of inequality. The couple's main conflict arose over sexual relations. At one point, the wife demanded to be on top during lovemaking. Adam refused to obey, as Lilith had obeyed him, and went to complain to God.
Having learned about the wrath of the Lord, Lilith decided to flee from the Garden of Eden. Having called the secret name of God, the woman, with the help of his power, rose above the water and flew away from Eden. At the Red Sea, three sent pursuing angels were able to overtake the fugitive. The first woman was severely punished, but legends describe the essence of the punishment in different ways. According to some myths, Lilith constantly feels the pain of hundreds of dying native children every day, others say that the woman was disfigured, and others claim that Adam’s first wife simply became infertile and gave birth exclusively to demons.
It is believed that the woman was saved by the angel Samael, who became Lucifer or Satan. They were united by common goals and aspirations. The image of Lilith is often accompanied by snakes, because the Serpent is one of the forms of the devil.
Giver of life and death
In Sumerian legends there is also a mention of Lilith (these people called her Lilitu). The image of this Lilith is significantly different from the Babylonian one. The Sumerian myth tells that even before the creation of the earth, Mount Atlen was located in the Universe. One day there was a terrible shock, and the mountain began to bleed.
At that moment Lilitu was born. All living creatures died and turned to ashes at the moment of her fiery birth. When Lilitu opened her eyes and saw what had happened to the world, she cried bitterly. Her tears turned into life-giving rivers. In every place where Lilitu set foot, flowers bloomed.
Where she sat, the earth began to come to life, giving life to trees and grasses. This is how the wonderful garden of Lilitu appeared, where animals and birds appeared, and later even people came to the beautiful goddess to live next to her.
One day, the Grand Duke arrived at the garden of Lilitu, on Atlen. He asked for the beauty's hand in marriage, but she rejected him. In anger, the prince began to pursue the girl. In an impotent rage, he tracked down two lions and killed them. But Lilitu resurrected the animals with her tears.
Then the prince chased after her, and Lilitu turned into a bird. After much tossing and suffering, the Grand Duke was ready to give up his life. Having learned about this, Lilitu had mercy.
“I will kiss you only once,” said Lilitu. Alas, the kiss turned out to be fatal for the prince. The pleasure from it filled his heart so much that it simply could not stand it. Lilita could love and give life, but her kisses brought only death.
Why did Adam's first wife, Lilith, leave (from the Bible)
The woman created from clay ran away due to her unwillingness to put up with the established order of things. An extremely interesting parallel to the parable is drawn by historians and cultural experts. The first myths arose at the moment of humanity's transition from a matriarchal system to a patriarchal one. Any attempts by women to claim their rights were then perceived with hostility by society. The humiliation of Lilith and her primacy in the world clearly sends researchers back to early matriarchal times.
Another reason for the first wife's departure was pride, which consisted of disobedience to the Lord. Some Kabbalists believe that the woman really loved Adam and only wanted to test whether her husband and God loved her. As a result, Lilith was severely punished. The final destruction of the good and bright maternal principle in the first woman was consolidated by the creation of Eve from Adam’s rib. The very fact of such an origin implied the subordination of the new woman to her husband. As a result, Eve and Lilith are antagonistic to each other.
Interpreters believe that the sin of Adam's first wife was less than the sin of Eve. The woman made of clay herself left the Garden of Eden, and was not expelled: the Lord was ready to forgive Lilith, and Eve violated the will of the Creator by eating the forbidden fruit.
Scandal in Adam's family
So, according to the statement of the Hebrew author, Adam’s first wife was not Eve at all, but a certain Lilith. He expressed this statement in a book called “The Alphabet of Ben Sira.” It is highly respected among followers of Judaism, while in the Christian world it is not recognized at all and is considered apocryphal (not a canonical text).
The author says nothing about the origin of Lilith and begins the story with the fact that one day this obstinate woman flatly refused to obey her husband on the grounds that she was the same creation of Jehovah God as himself, and therefore had equal rights with him in everything. Having thus begun the struggle for the emancipation of women, Adam's first wife Lilith pronounced aloud the name of God, Yahweh, and, having acquired secret powers, flew away from her husband.
Children of Lilith and the cave
Myths have not preserved information about the children of Adam and Lilith, although today some theologians are confident in their existence. The children of the first couple were chthonic monsters and giants - not an evil or good force, an exclusively earthly creation that did not arise by the will of the Lord, but created by the very first of the women.
Mentions of creatures are found in all world religions, except Abrahamic ones. Jews, Muslims and Christians decided to remove from history information about the violation of God's Will by the first woman.
According to legend, the demon subsequently began to exist in two forms: the Elder Lilith was the wife of Samael and the mother of all demons, while the Younger personified lust and was the companion of the demon Asmodeus. The youngest lived in a cave and went out into the world only at night, seducing random travelers and men who were left at home alone. This hypostasis was also in charge of hundreds of spirits subordinate to it - succubi, incubi and night ghosts who stole the breath of babies.
In Orthodox Jewish communities there is still a tradition that young men are not allowed to spend the night alone, and the father of the child on the last night before circumcision is obliged to read the Torah over the baby until dawn.
The mythical image of Adam's first wife existed among different peoples of Mesopotamia. Subsequently, any mention of the first wife was carefully eradicated, because the story of Adam and Lilith did not correspond to established patriarchal traditions. Now more and more sources are being discovered confirming the existence and importance of the truly first woman in the origins of the Christian, Muslim and Jewish faiths.
Lilith in Jewish sources [↑]
In the Tanakh, the word “lilit” appears once: in the 34th chapter of the book of Yeshayahu, which talks about what will happen during and after the war of Gog and Magog. “And steppe animals will meet (there) with wild cats, and a goat will call to another; Lilith will rest there and find peace for herself” (34:14). There is no mention of Adam in these lines.
At the simplest level, commentators explain that Lilith
- this is some kind of bird (from the category of owls or eagle owls) that screams and cries, especially at night. And it is in Edom, about which the Prophet speaks, that this bird will find peace.
In the fairy tales and myths of the peoples of the world that have come down to us, owls, owls, and cats often accompany witches. The word lilith
, derived from the word
layla
, “night”, symbolizes eroticism and everything connected with it.
The Midrash tells that after the murder of Abel, Adam separated from Chava, reasoning like this: “Why give birth to children if they kill each other?” In the 130 years that they did not live together, Adam was overcome by erotic outbursts. It is believed that from such erotic thoughts the evil spirit receives offspring and thus multiplies.
Lilith in the Babylonian Talmud
mentioned at least four times, but in none of these cases as Adam's wife.
The Talmud says, for example, that a person should beware of sleeping alone in the house - because Lilith
can attack him in his sleep - and also mentions that
Lilith
can affect the outcome of pregnancy.
Hebrew text that contains many references to Lilith
, is the Book of Zohar.
Its depths cannot be comprehended without knowing the secrets of the hidden Torah, but we can get some vague idea of what lilith
.
In the Zohar section “Midrash Haneelam”
, we read:
“Rav Isaac said in the name of Rav: Adam was created together with someone else, as it is said, “Male and female He created them” ( Genesis 5:2
), and God separated her from him and brought her to him, as it is written: “And He took one of his sides (ribs).” Rav Yehoshua said: There was an Eve before the one who was taken away because she was an evil spirit, and another was given in her place. Rava said: the second was a physical being, but the first was not, but was made of dirt and impurity.”
It is obvious to the author of the Book of Zohar that the being who preceded Eve was not a person, but a spirit: harmful and unclean. Another Zohar passage, on Vayikra 19a
, names the name of the evil spirit:
“Come and see: there is a woman, the spirit of all spirits, and her name is Lilith, and she was first with Adam. And in that hour when Adam was created and his body was completed, a thousand spirits from the left (bad) side clung to this body until the Holy One, Blessed be He, shouted at them and drove them away. And Adam lay there, a body without a spirit, and was green, and all these spirits surrounded him. At that hour a cloud descended and drove away all these spirits. And when Adam stood up, his woman was attached to his side. And that holy spirit that was in him spread in all directions and grew, and so he became complete. After this, the Holy One, Blessed be He, divided Adam into two parts and made a woman. And He brought her to Adam in her perfection, like a bride to the chuppah. When Lilith saw this, she fled."
The Zohar here writes, based on verses from Bereshit, that Adam was created as a man and a woman joined by sides/ribs, and the female side of this person is Eve. Lilith was the spirit that was with Adam before he and Eve were separated, and after their separation and marriage, Lilith fled. It is also clear from this passage that Lilith
is an evil spirit, not a real person of flesh and blood.
The great Kabbalist Arizal (Rabbi Yitzchak Luria) writes that Samael is in charge of all "male" demons called Mazikim ("pests"), and his "wife" Lilith is in charge of all "female" demons called Shedim ("devils") ( Shaar HaPsukim
to the Psalms).
The gematria of the word "lilith" is 480, and it is believed that she has 480 "subordinates". Arizal understood lilith
as the spirit of lust that still exists in the world and poses a danger.
The Zohar defines Lilith
as "plunging the world into ruins" since its role is to introduce immorality into the minds and actions of people.
Based on the understanding of the Arizal, the above two passages from the Zohar can be explained as follows. The first passage tells us that Adam had an “evil spirit” within him, which was removed when he had a wife and he could turn his desire into holy action through intimate relations with his wife.
The second passage says essentially the same thing: that Lilith, who represents lust, “fled” when Adam married his bride, Eve.
Birth of Eve
According to the Bible, Adam saw that every animal found a mate and therefore felt lonely. Then God decided to create a couple for him too. The story of how God created woman says that the Lord put Adam to sleep and created the first woman from his rib. After awakening, Adam was very happy when he saw his mate and named her Eve, which means “life.” The Bible goes on to say that these first people loved each other and helped in everything.
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So, how and why God created woman is clear to us. However, there is an alternative version of these biblical events.
Demon of night
Two centuries later, the image of Lilith changed somewhat. In Jewish religious literature, as well as in folklore, she began to be represented not as a snake, but as a kind of demon ─ the spirit of the night. By the way, the name Lilith itself is translated from Hebrew as “night.” It especially often affects men who sleep alone or wander alone on night roads.
She appears to them in the form of a silent and beautiful woman with long flowing black hair. Her relationship with the leader of the demons, Samael, also changed. If in earlier times they were considered lovers, then around the 15th century she became his “legal” wife.
A godsend for Satanists
In conclusion, it should be noted that the image of a night demon in a female form has become widely used by followers of modern Satanism, greedy for all kinds of devilry. In their interpretation, the wife of Samael, or in other words, of Satan, with whom they identify him, fully corresponds to all the devils or, as they put it, “black goddesses.” Accordingly, she has many images and names.
Thus, Lilith often appears in them in the form of such religious characters of the Ancient World as the Sumerian-Akkadian mistress of the underworld ─ Ereshkigal, the ancient Greek mistress of the underworld ─ Hecate, or the gloomy creation of Scandinavian folklore ─ Uma. However, in all cases, she carries within herself the image of the “Dark Mother” - the destroyer of light.
Retribution
Of course, Lilith didn't get away with it. The angels punished her for her insolence before the Lord and for trampling marital ties. In various literary monuments that appeared during the Middle Ages and containing a retelling of the work of Jesus Ben Sira, three different punishments were sent down on her by angels. According to one version, Lilith was doomed to give birth to a hundred babies who died in the womb every night, according to another, she was destined to become the mother of countless demons, and according to the third, the poor thing was faced with complete infertility, which, of course, is preferable to the first two options.
But the story of Lilith ─ Adam’s wife ─ did not end there. She vowed that henceforth, not being able to produce her own children, she would destroy strangers. However, she promised to spare those of them whose mother would protect the child with an amulet in the form of a tablet with her name (according to another version, with the names of the three angels sent for her).
