You might know Lilith as Adam's real first wife who preceded Eve, or maybe as the first
vampire, or a succubus.
Heck, in The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Lilith is Satan's Concubine disguised as a
high school teacher.
But where did the legend of Lilith come from, and what's her real story?
If you read the first few chapters of the book of Genesis in the Bible, you'll notice
that there are two accounts of the creation of human beings that are slightly different.
The first, in Genesis 1:27, says God created man and woman at the same time, both in his
own image.
Chapter 2, however, gives the more familiar expanded version where God makes Adam out
of the clay and then makes Eve from his rib.
The discrepancy is likely because the Bible's original editors were trying to stitch together
different versions of the creation story into one master text.
Most Christians simply treat the second version as an expansion of the first.
But in the tradition of rabbinic Judaism, it's widely held that these are accounts of
two different women - the first being Lilith, and the second being Eve.
So what's Lilith's story?
The earliest version of what modern readers would recognize as the Lilith legend comes
from the collection of satirical proverbs known as The Alphabet of Ben Sirah, written
sometime between the 8th and 11th centuries A.D.
And it's a doozy because it says that Lilith and Adam broke up because they disagreed about
who should be in the dominant position during intercourse.
Unwilling to accept a subservient position since they were created as equals, Lilith
blasphemes by shouting the unspeakable true name of God and then literally flies away.
Lilith's unwillingness to accept an inferior status hints at why Lilith has become a modern
day feminist icon.
The part about her killing babies, though, not so much.
Here's the rest of the Ben Sirah account: After flying away, Lilith basically turns
into a demon mom and begins giving birth to scores of demons every day.
God tries to convince her to go back to Adam, but she refuses, and instead hunts Adam's
offspring, the children of mankind, in retribution.
There's another tradition, though, like the one from the sect of Jewish mysticism called
The Kabbalah which posits Lilith and the dark archangel Samael were created by God as dark
mirror images of Adam and Eve.
Some Kabbalah texts even suggest Lilith was actually the serpent in the Garden of Eden
who tempted Eve.
Still other traditions say that Lilith isn't just any demon, but rather the queen of demons.
A seducer of men, this demon queen version still hunts children, but could be warded
off with special amulets.
In this context, the legend of Lilith generally was used to explain high child mortality rates
in ancient times, and teach societal norms about intercourse and the subsequent care
of children.
So even the evil demon version of Lilith has her good side.
Before the Hebrew stories that became the Bible, though, there were earlier legends
that many scholars believe formed the foundation of the Lilith mythology.
A prototype for Lilith can be found in the Sumerian poem The Epic of Gilgamesh, which
itself is basically a first draft of the Bible.
And artifacts dating back as far as the seventh century B.C. seem to invoke protective magic
against Lilith.
Perhaps the biggest influence on the Jewish mythology, however, would be the Assyrian
demon Lilit.
The name Lilit seems to be the feminine version of Lilu, an Akkadian name which is related
to the word for demon.
Some scholars believe the name Lilith is also related to the Hebrew word for night, while
others argue it comes from the Sumerian word for wind - all of which may explain why in
ancient legends, Lilith was mostly seen as a winged demon of the night.
The single actual reference to Lilith in the Bible appears in Isaiah 34:14, in a passage
describing the destruction that will be found after God lays his judgment on the nation
of Edom.
It says that thorns and brambles will grow over the city, and its walls will become a
home for jackals and owls.
It goes on to say that the city will be filled with hyenas and satyrs, and, quote, "there
too shall Lilith repose."
Different translations re-interpret Lilith as all sorts of weird things, from a donkey
centaur to a screech owl.
Some versions translate Lilith as "lamia," which makes sense, as in Greco-Roman mythology,
Lamia was the name of a queen who turned into a child-eating monster.
And some amazing versions of the Bible even straight up translate it as "vampire!"
That interpretation is the one that has gained the most traction in pop culture, as everyone
from Marvel Comics, to the 1996 movie Bordello of Blood, to the HBO series True Blood has
depicted Lilith as the Queen of the Vampires.
Demons, vampires, donkey centaurs…is there anything she isn't queen of?
Despite being a figure that does not appear at all in the canonical Bible and that only
arises from folklore, tradition, and foreign mythology, Lilith has enjoyed great success
as a character in various forms of popular culture.
She is, for example, a major player in The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, where she
is arguably the main antagonist, the mother of demons, and Satan's very jealous concubine.
The archetype of the "evil wife" that Lilith represents also informed the choice of naming
Frasier Crane's cold, somewhat controlling wife (and later ex-wife) Lilith Sternin.
On the flipside of that portrayal, a more modern reappraisal of Lilith's character would
reveal her as a woman who was punished for demanding equality, and as such, she became
something of a feminist icon, giving her name to the popular 1990s all-woman touring music
festival Lilith Fair.
And then there's the seminal anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion, in which Lilith is
revealed to be the name of the second angel.
Lilith likewise can be found sprinkled all across pop culture, from books to movies to
anime to video games such as Castlevania, Final Fantasy, and Darkstalkers.
Sometimes she's depicted as a vampire, sometimes a demon, sometimes a succubus, and sometimes
just a domineering wife.
However she's depicted, it's clear that Lilith has transcended her pseudo-Biblical roots
to become a major part of pop culture today.
Who's on top now, Adam?
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