No subject

Some say the God created man and woman in His own image on the Sixth
Day, giving them charge over the world, but that Eve did not yet exist.
Now, God had set Adam to name every beast, bird and other living thing.
When they passed before him in pairs, male and female, Adam --being
already like a twenty-year-old man-- felt jealous of their loves, and
though he tried coupling with each female creature in turn, found no
satisfaction in the act. He therefore cried: "Every creature but I has
a proper mate!" and prayed God would remedy this injustice. [1]

God then formed Lilith, the first woman, just as He had formed Adam,
except that he used filth and sediment instead of pure dust. From
Adam's union with this demoness, and with another like her named
Naamah, Tubal Cain's sister, sprang Asmodeus and innumerable demons
that still plague mankind. Many generations later, Lilith and Naamah
came to Solomon's judgement seat, disguised as harlots of Jerusalem.
[2]

Adam and Lilith never found peace together, for when he wished to lie
with her, she took offence at the recumbent position he demanded. "Why
must I lie beneath you?" she asked. "I also was made from dust, and am
therefore your equal." Because Adam tried to compel her obedience by
force, Lilith, in a rage, uttered the magic name of God, rose into the
air and left him.

Adam complained to God: "I have been deserted by my helpmeet." God at
once sent the angels Senoy, Sansenoy and Semangelof to fetch Lilith
back. They found her beside the Red Sea, a region abounding in
lascivious demons, to whom she bore 'lilim' at the rate of more than
one hundred a day. "Return to Adam without delay," the angels said, "or
we will drown you!" Lilith asked: "How can I return to Adam and live
like an honest housewife, after my stay beside the Red Sea?" "It will
be death to refuse!" they answered. "How can I die," Lilith asked
again, "when God has ordered me to take charge of all newborn children:
boys up to the eighth day of life, that of circumcision; girls up to
the twentieth day. None the less, if ever I see your three names or
likenesses displayed in an amulet above a newborn child, I promise to
spare it." To this they agreed; but God punished Lilith by making one
hundred of her demon children perish daily; [3] and if she could not
destroy a human infant, because of the angelic amulet, she would
spitefully turn against her own. [4]

Some say that Lilith ruled as queen in Zmargad, and again in Sheba; and
was the demoness who destroyed Job's sons. [5] Yet she escaped the
curse of death which overtook Adam, since they had parted long before
the Fall. Lilith and Naamah not only strangle infants but also seduce
dreaming men, and one of whom, sleeping alone, may become their victim.
[6]

Notes:

[1] Divergences between the Creation myths of Genesis I and II, which
allow Lilith to be presumed as Adam's first mate, result from a
careless weaving together of an early Judean and a late priestly
tradition. The older version contains the rib incident. Lilith typifies
the Anath-worshipping Canaanite women, who were permitted pre-nuptial
promiscuity. Time after time the prophets denounced Israelite women for
following Canaanite practices; at first, apparently, with the priests'
approval -- since their habit of dedicating to God the fees thus earned
is expressly forbidden in Deuteronomy XXIII:18. Lilith's flight to the
Red Sea recalls the ancient Hebrew view that water attracts demons.
"Tortured and rebellious demons" also found safe harbourage in Egypt.
Thus Asmodeus, who had strangled Sarah's first six husbands, fled "to
the uttermost parts of Egypt" (Tobit VIII:3), when Tobias burned the
heart and liver of a fish on their wedding night.

[2] Lilith's bargain with the angels has its ritual counterpart in an
apotropaic {1} rite once performed in many Jewish communities. To
protect the newborn child against Lilith --and especially a male, until
he could be permanently safeguarded by circumcision-- a ring was drawn
with natron, or charcoal, on the wall of the birthroom, and inside it
were written the words: "Adam and Eve. Out, Lilith!" Also the names
Senoy, Sansenoy and Semangelof (meanings uncertain) were inscribed on
the door. If Lilith nevertheless succeeded in approaching the child and
fondling him, he would laugh in his sleep. To avert danger, it was held
wise to strike the sleeping child's lips with one finger -- whereupon
Lilith would vanish.

[3] 'Lilith' is usually derived from the Babylonian-Assyrian word
'lilitu,' 'a female demon, or wind-spirit' -- one of a triad mentioned
in Babylonian spells. But she appears earlier as 'Lillake' on a 2000 BC
Sumerian tablet from Ur containing the tale of _Gilgamesh and the
Willow Tree_. There she is a demoness dwelling in the trunk of a willow
tree tended by the Goddess Inanna (Anath) on the banks of the
Euphrates. Popular Hebrew etymology seems to have derived 'Lilith' from
'layil,' 'night'; and she therefore often appears as a hairy
night-monster, as she also does in Arabian folklore. Solomon suspected
the Queen of Sheba of being Lilith, because she had hairy legs. His
judgement on the two harlots is recorded in 1 Kings III:16. According
to Isaiah XXXIV:14-15, Lilith dwells among the desolate ruins in the
Edomite Desert where satyrs ("se'ir"), reems {2}, pelicans, owls {3},
jackals, ostriches, arrow-snakes and kites {4} keep her company.

[4] Lilith's children are called 'lilim.' In the _Targum Yerushalmi_,
the priestly blessing of Numbers VI:26 becomes: "The Lord bless thee in
all thy doings, and preserve thee from the Lilim!" The fourth-century
AD commentator Hieronymous identified Lilith with the Greek Lamia, a
Libyan queen deserted by Zeus, whom his wife Hera robbed of her
children. She took revenge by robbing other women of theirs.

[5] The Lamiae, who seduced sleeping men, sucked their blood and ate
their flesh, as Lilith and her fellow-demonesses did, were also known
as 'Empusae,' 'forcers-in'; or 'Mormolyceia,' 'frightening wolves'; and
described as 'Children of Hecate.' A Hellenistic relief shows a naked
Lamia straddling a traveller asleep on his back. It is characteristic
of civilizations where women are treated as chattels that they must
adopt the recumbent posture during intercourse, which Lilith refused.
That Greek witches who worshipped Hecate favoured the superior posture,
we know from Apuleius; and it occurs in early Sumerian representations
of the sexual act, though not in the Hittite. Malinowski writes that
Melanesian girls ridicule what they call 'the missionary position,'{5}
which demands that they should lie passive and recumbent.

[6] 'Naamah,' 'pleasant,' is explained as meaning that 'the demoness
sang pleasant songs to idols.' 'Zmargad' suggests 'smaragdos,' the
semi-precious aquamarine; and may therefore be her submarine dwelling.
A demon named Smaragos occurs in the _Homeric Epigrams_.

- pps 65 - 69

{1} Apotropaic. "Intended to ward off evil."

{2} Reems. Thanks to Diccon Frankborn (dickney at access.digex.net) for
the following:

The reem -- properly, re'em, pronounced roughly "ray-em" -- was the
aurochs, the largest and most dangerous wild ox that ever lived.

{3} The owl is particularly sacred --if that's the right word-- to
Lilith. A Sumerian relief, now popularly available in reproduction,
shows her with owl's feet, standing on the backs of a pair of lions and
holding the Sumerian version of the Ankh in each hand.

{4} Kites. A carrion-bird, related to the vulture.

{5} Now you know where the term comes from!

Love is the law, love under will.



=====
I may be drunk, but you are ugly, and in the morning I will be sober.

- Winston Churchill

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Send instant messages with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com/