Date: March 10, 2010 at 15:02:11 From: Countrymarxist, Subject: Adma had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
Lilith John Collier 1887 (The Atkinson Art Gallery, Southport, England)
Eve & Lilith In an effort to explain inconsistencies in the Old Testament, there developed in Jewish literature a complex interpretive system called the midrash which attempts to reconcile biblical contradictions and bring new meaning to the scriptural text.
Employing both a philological method and often an ingenious imagination, midrashic writings, which reached their height in the 2nd century CE, influenced later Christian interpretations of the Bible. Inconsistencies in the story of Genesis, especially the two separate accounts of creation, received particular attention. Later, beginning in the 13th century CE, such questions were also taken up in Jewish mystical literature known as the Kabbalah.
According to midrashic literature, Adam's first wife was not Eve but a woman named Lilith, who was created in the first Genesis account. Only when Lilith rebelled and abandoned Adam did God create Eve, in the second account, as a replacement. In an important 13th century Kabbalah text, the Sefer ha-Zohar ("The Book of Splendour") written by the Spaniard Moses de Leon (c. 1240-1305), it is explained that:
At the same time Jehovah created Adam, he created a woman, Lilith, who like Adam was taken from the earth. She was given to Adam as his wife. But there was a dispute between them about a matter that when it came before the judges had to be discussed behind closed doors. She spoke the unspeakable name of Jehovah and vanished. In the Alpha Betha of Ben Sira (Alphabetum Siracidis, or Sepher Ben Sira), an anonymous collection of midrashic proverbs probably compiled in the 11th century C.E., it is explained more explicitly that the conflict arose because Adam, as a way of asserting his authority over Lilith, insisted that she lie beneath him during sexual intercourse (23 A-B). Lilith, however, considering herself to be Adam's equal, refused, and after pronouncing the Ineffable Name (i.e. the magic name of God) flew off into the air.
Adam, distraught and no doubt also angered by her insolent behaviour, wanted her back. On Adam's request, God sent three angels, named Senoy, Sansenoy, and Semangelof, who found her in the Red Sea. Despite the threat from the three angels that if she didn't return to Adam one hundred of her sons would die every day, she refused, claiming that she was created expressly to harm newborn infants. However, she did swear that she would not harm any infant wearing an amulet with the images and/or names of the three angels on it.
At this point, the legend of Lilith as the "first Eve" merges with the earlier legend of Sumero-Babylonian origin, dating from around 3,500 BCE, of Lilith as a winged female demon who kills infants and endangers women in childbirth. In this role, she was one of several mazakim or "harmful spirits" known from incantation formulas preserved in Assyrian, Hebrew, and Canaanite inscriptions intended to protect against them. As a female demon, she is closely related to Lamashtu whose evilness included killing children, drinking the blood of men, and eating their flesh. Lamashtu also caused pregnant women to miscarry, disturbed sleep and brought nightmares.
In turn, Lamashtu is like another demonized female called Lamia, a Libyan serpent goddess, whose name is probably a Greek variant of Lamashtu. Like Lamashtu, Lamia also killed children. In the guise of a beautiful woman, she also seduced young men. In the Latin Vulgate Bible, Lamia is given as the translation of the Hebrew Lilith (and in other translations it is given as "screech owl" and "night monster").
It needs to be remembered that these demonic "women" are essentially personifications of unseen forces invented to account for otherwise inexplicable events and phenomena which occur in the real world. Lilith, Lamashtu, Lamia and other female demons like them are all associated with the death of children and especially with the death of newborn infants.
It may be easily imagined that they were held accountable for such things as Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS, also called crib death, or cot death) where an apparently healthy infant dies for no obvious reason. Cot death occurs almost always during sleep at night and is the most common cause of death of infants. Its cause still remains unknown.
By inventing evil spirits like Lilith, Lamashtu, and Lamia, parents were not only able to identify the enemy but also to know what they had to guard against. Amulets with the names of the three angels were intended to protect against the power of Lilith.
Lilith also personified licentiousness and lust. In the Christian Middle Ages she, or her female offspring, the lilim, became identified with succubae (the female counterparts of incubi) who would copulate with men in their sleep, causing them to have nocturnal emissions or "wet dreams."
Again, Lilith and her kind serve as a way of accounting for an otherwise inexplicable phenomenon among men. Today, 85 percent of all men experience "wet dreams" (the ejaculation of sperm while asleep) at some time in their lives, mostly during their teens and twenties and as often as once a month. In the Middle Ages, celibate monks would attempt to guard against these nocturnal visits by the lilith/succubus by sleeping with their hands crossed over their genitals and holding a crucifix.
Through the literature of the Kabbalah, Lilith became fixed in Jewish demonology where her primary role is that of strangler of children and a seducer of men. The Kabbalah further enhanced her demonic character by making her the partner of Samael (i.e. Satan) and queen of the realm of the forces of evil.
In this guise, she appears as the antagonistic negative counterpart of the Shekhinah ("Divine Presence"), the mother of the House of Israel. The Zohar repeatedly contrasts Lilith the unholy whorish woman with the Shekhinah as the holy, noble, and capable woman. In much the same way, Eve the disobedient, lustful sinner is contrasted with the obedient and holy Virgin Mary in Christian literature.
Through her couplings with the devil (or with Adam, as his succubus), Lilith gave birth to one hundred demonic children a day (the one hundred children threatened with death by the three angels). In this way, Lilith was held responsible for populating the world with evil.
If you ask how Lilith herself, the first wife of Adam, became evil, the answer lies in her insubordination to her husband Adam. It is her independence from Adam, her position beyond the control of a male, that makes her "evil."
She is disobedient and like Eve, and indeed all women who are willful, she is perceived as posing a constant threat to the divinely ordered state of affairs defined by men.
Lilith is represented as a powerfully sexual woman against whom men and babies felt they had few defenses and, except for a few amulets, little protection. Much more so than Eve, Lilith is the personification female sexuality.
Her legend serves to demonstrate how, when unchecked, female sexuality is disruptive and destructive. Lilith highlights how women, beginning with Eve, use their sexuality to seduce men. She provides thereby a necessary sexual dimension, which is otherwise lacking, to the Genesis story which, when read in literal terms, portrays Eve not as some wicked femme fatale but as a naive and largely sexless fool. Only as a Lilith-like character could Eve be seen as a calculating, evil, seductress.
Lilith is referred to only once in the Old Testament. In the Darby translation of Isaiah 34:14 the original Hebrew word is rendered as "lilith"; according to Isaiah, when God's vengeance has turned the land into a wilderness, "there shall the beasts of the desert meet with the jackals, and the wild goat shall cry to his fellow; the lilith also shall settle there, and find for herself a place of rest." The same word is translated elsewhere, however, as "screech owl, "night creatures," "night monsters," and "night hag."
Although it has been suggested that the association with night stems from a similarity between the Sumero-Babylonian demon Lilitu and the Hebrew word laylah meaning "night," Lilith nonetheless seems to have been otherwise associated with darkness and night as a time of fear, vulnerability, and evil.
In her demonized form, Lilith is a frightening and threatening creature. Much more so than Eve, she personifies the real (sexual) power women exercise over men.
She represents the deeper, darker fear men have of women and female sexuality. Inasmuch as female sexuality, as a result of this fear, has been repressed and subjected to the severest controls in Western patriarchal society, so too has the figure of Lilith been kept hidden.
However, she lurks as a powerful unidentified presence, an unspoken name, in the minds of biblical commentators for whom Eve and Lilith become inextricably intertwined and blended into one person. Importantly, it is this Eve/Lilith amalgam which is used to identify women as the true source of evil in the world.
In the Apocryphal Testament of Reuben (one of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, ostensibly the twelve sons of Jacob), for example, it is explained that:
Women are evil, my children: because they have no power or strength to stand up against man, they use wiles and try to ensnare him by their charms; and man, whom woman cannot subdue by strength, she subdues by guile. (Testament of Reuben: V, 1-2, 5) References to Lilith in the Talmud describe her as a night demon with long hair (B. Erubin 100b) and as having a human likeness but with wings (B. Nidda 24b). In Rabbi Isaac ben Jacob ha-Kohen's "Treatise on the Emanations on the Left," written in Spain in the 13th century, she is described as having the form of a beautiful woman from her head to her waist, and "burning fire" from her waist down. Elsewhere, Rabbi Isaac equates her with the primordial serpent Leviathan.
Crudely drawn images of Lilith can be seen on amulets (see Magical or Prophylactic images of Lilith in incantation bowls and on amulets).
Lilith? Babylonian terra-cotta relief, c. 2000 BCE (Collection of Colonel James Colville)
A Babylonian terra-cotta relief dated to around 2000 BCE in the collection of Colonel Norman Corville has been identified as a representation of Lilith (the identification has been questioned by a number of scholars). The relief shows a nude woman with wings and a bird's taloned feet. She wears a hat composed of four pairs of horns and holds in each upraised hand a combined ring and rod (similar to an Egyptian shen ring amulet). She stands on two reclining lions and is flanked by owls.
Despite the fact that she is not officially recognized in the Christian tradition, in the Late Middle Ages she is occasionally identified with the serpent in Genesis 3 and shown accordingly with a woman's head and torso. For example, the bare-breasted woman with a snake's lower parts posed seductively in the branches of the tree between Adam and Eve in the scene of the temptation carved into the base of the trumeau in the left doorway of the West façade of the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris has been identified as Lilith.
Adam, Lilith, and Eve relief sculpture, c. 1210 CE Base of trumeau, left portal, West Façade, Notre Dame, Paris
Date: March 10, 2010 at 20:35:52 From: Nonpolly, Subject: Re: Adma had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
In the Apocrychal Testament of Reuben (one of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, ostensibly the twelve sons of Jacob), for example, it is explained that:<<<<<
CM, The Testament of Reuben comprises two chapters: Here is chapter one.
The copy of the Testament of Reuben,even the commands which he gave his sons before he died in the hundred and twenty-fifth year of his life.
2 Two years after the death of Joseph his brother, when Reuben fell ill, his sons' and his sons, were gathered together to visit him.
3 And he said to them: My children, I am dying, and go the way of my fathers.
4 And seeing there Judah, and Gad, and Asher, his brethren, he said to them: Raise me up, that I may tell to my brethren and to my children what things I have hidden in my heart, for behold now at length I am passing away.
5 And he arose and kissed them, and said unto them: Hear, my brethren, and do ye, my children, give ear to Reuben your father, in the commands I give unto you.
6 And behold I call to witness against you this day the God of heaven, that you walk not in the sins of youth and fornication, wherein I was poured out, and defiled the bed of my father Jacob.
7 And I tell you that he smote me with a sore plauge in my loins for seven months: and had not my father Jacob prayed for me to thye Lord, the Loprd would have destroyed me..
8 For I was thirty years old when I wrought the evil thing before the Lord, and for seven months I was sick unto death.
9 And after this I repented with set purpose of my soul for seven years before the Lord.
10 And wine and strong drink I drank not, and flesh entered not into my mouth, and I ate no pleasant food: but I mourned over my sin, for it was great, such as has not been in Israel.
11 And now hear me, my children, what things I saw concerning the seven spirits of deceit when I repented.
12 Seven spirits therefore are appointed against man, and they are the leaders in the works of youth.
13 And seven other spirits are given to him at his creation, that through them should be done every work of man.
14 The first is the spirit of life, with which the constitution of man is created.
15 The second is the sense of sight, with which ariseth desire.
16 The third is the sense of hearing, to which cometh teaching.
17 The fourth is the sense of smell, with which tastes are given. to draw to draw air and breath.
18 The fifth is the power of speech, with which cometh knowledge.
The sixth is the sense of taste, with which cometh the eating of meats and drinks: and by it strength is produced, for in food is the foundation of strength.
20 The seventh is the power of procreation and sexual intercourse, with which through love of pleasure sins enter in.
21 Wherefore it is the last in order of creation, and the first in theat of youth, because it is filled with ignorance, and leadeth the youth as a blind man to a pit, and as a beast to a precipice.
22 Besides all these there is an eight spirit of sleep, with which is brought about the trance of nature and the image of death.
23 With these spirits are mingled the spirit of error.
24 First, the spirit of fornication is seated in the nature and in the senses;
25 The second, the spirit of insatiableness, in the belly;
26 The third, thje spirit of fighting, in the liver and gall.
27 The fourth is the spirit of obsequiousness and chicanery, that through officious attention one may be fair in seeming:
28 The fifth is the spirit of pride, that one may be boastfuland arrogant.
29 The sixth is the spirit of lying, in perdition and jealousy to practice deceits, and concealments from kindreds and friends.
30 The seventh is the spirit of injustice, with which are thefts and acts of rapacity, that a man may fulfil the desire of his heart; for injustice worketh trogetjher with the other spirits by the taking of gifts.
31 And with all these the spirit of sleep is joined which is that of error and fantasy.
32 And so perisheth every young man, darkening his mind from the truth, and not understanding the law of God, nor obeying the admonitionsof his fathers, as befell me also in my youth.
33 And now, my children, love the truth, and it will preserve you: hear ye the words of Reuben your father.
34 Pay no heed to the face of a woman,
35 nor associate with another man's wife,
36 Nor meddle with affairs of womankind.
37 For had not I seen Bilhah bathing in a covered place, I had not fallen into this great iniquity.
38 For my mind taking in the thought of her nakedness, suffered me not to sleep until I had wrought the abominable thing.
39 For while Jacob our father had gone to Issac his father, when we wqere in Eder, near to Ephrath in Bethlehem, Bilhah became drunkand was asleep uncovered in her chamber.
40 Having therefore gone in and beheld her nakedness, I wrought the impiety without her perceiving it, and leaving her sleeping I departed.
41 And Fourthwith an angel of God revealed to my father concerning my impiety, and he came and mourned over me, and touched her no moire.
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Date: March 10, 2010 at 18:45:13 From: Countrymarxist, Subject: (correction) Re: Adma had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
Lilith John Collier 1887 (The Atkinson Art Gallery, Southport, England)
Eve & Lilith In an effort to explain inconsistencies in the Old Testament, there developed in Jewish literature a complex interpretive system called the midrash which attempts to reconcile biblical contradictions and bring new meaning to the scriptural text.
Employing both a philological method and often an ingenious imagination, midrashic writings, which reached their height in the 2nd century CE, influenced later Christian interpretations of the Bible. Inconsistencies in the story of Genesis, especially the two separate accounts of creation, received particular attention. Later, beginning in the 13th century CE, such questions were also taken up in Jewish mystical literature known as the Kabbalah.
According to midrashic literature, Adam's first wife was not Eve but a woman named Lilith, who was created in the first Genesis account. Only when Lilith rebelled and abandoned Adam did God create Eve, in the second account, as a replacement. In an important 13th century Kabbalah text, the Sefer ha-Zohar ("The Book of Splendour") written by the Spaniard Moses de Leon (c. 1240-1305), it is explained that:
At the same time Jehovah created Adam, he created a woman, Lilith, who like Adam was taken from the earth. She was given to Adam as his wife. But there was a dispute between them about a matter that when it came before the judges had to be discussed behind closed doors. She spoke the unspeakable name of Jehovah and vanished. In the Alpha Betha of Ben Sira (Alphabetum Siracidis, or Sepher Ben Sira), an anonymous collection of midrashic proverbs probably compiled in the 11th century C.E., it is explained more explicitly that the conflict arose because Adam, as a way of asserting his authority over Lilith, insisted that she lie beneath him during sexual intercourse (23 A-B). Lilith, however, considering herself to be Adam's equal, refused, and after pronouncing the Ineffable Name (i.e. the magic name of God) flew off into the air.
Adam, distraught and no doubt also angered by her insolent behaviour, wanted her back. On Adam's request, God sent three angels, named Senoy, Sansenoy, and Semangelof, who found her in the Red Sea. Despite the threat from the three angels that if she didn't return to Adam one hundred of her sons would die every day, she refused, claiming that she was created expressly to harm newborn infants. However, she did swear that she would not harm any infant wearing an amulet with the images and/or names of the three angels on it.
At this point, the legend of Lilith as the "first Eve" merges with the earlier legend of Sumero-Babylonian origin, dating from around 3,500 BCE, of Lilith as a winged female demon who kills infants and endangers women in childbirth. In this role, she was one of several mazakim or "harmful spirits" known from incantation formulas preserved in Assyrian, Hebrew, and Canaanite inscriptions intended to protect against them. As a female demon, she is closely related to Lamashtu whose evilness included killing children, drinking the blood of men, and eating their flesh. Lamashtu also caused pregnant women to miscarry, disturbed sleep and brought nightmares.
In turn, Lamashtu is like another demonized female called Lamia, a Libyan serpent goddess, whose name is probably a Greek variant of Lamashtu. Like Lamashtu, Lamia also killed children. In the guise of a beautiful woman, she also seduced young men. In the Latin Vulgate Bible, Lamia is given as the translation of the Hebrew Lilith (and in other translations it is given as "screech owl" and "night monster").
It needs to be remembered that these demonic "women" are essentially personifications of unseen forces invented to account for otherwise inexplicable events and phenomena which occur in the real world. Lilith, Lamashtu, Lamia and other female demons like them are all associated with the death of children and especially with the death of newborn infants.
It may be easily imagined that they were held accountable for such things as Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS, also called crib death, or cot death) where an apparently healthy infant dies for no obvious reason. Cot death occurs almost always during sleep at night and is the most common cause of death of infants. Its cause still remains unknown.
By inventing evil spirits like Lilith, Lamashtu, and Lamia, parents were not only able to identify the enemy but also to know what they had to guard against. Amulets with the names of the three angels were intended to protect against the power of Lilith.
Lilith also personified licentiousness and lust. In the Christian Middle Ages she, or her female offspring, the lilim, became identified with succubae (the female counterparts of incubi) who would copulate with men in their sleep, causing them to have nocturnal emissions or "wet dreams."
Again, Lilith and her kind serve as a way of accounting for an otherwise inexplicable phenomenon among men. Today, 85 percent of all men experience "wet dreams" (the ejaculation of sperm while asleep) at some time in their lives, mostly during their teens and twenties and as often as once a month. In the Middle Ages, celibate monks would attempt to guard against these nocturnal visits by the lilith/succubus by sleeping with their hands crossed over their genitals and holding a crucifix.
Through the literature of the Kabbalah, Lilith became fixed in Jewish demonology where her primary role is that of strangler of children and a seducer of men. The Kabbalah further enhanced her demonic character by making her the partner of Samael (i.e. Satan) and queen of the realm of the forces of evil.
In this guise, she appears as the antagonistic negative counterpart of the Shekhinah ("Divine Presence"), the mother of the House of Israel. The Zohar repeatedly contrasts Lilith the unholy whorish woman with the Shekhinah as the holy, noble, and capable woman. In much the same way, Eve the disobedient, lustful sinner is contrasted with the obedient and holy Virgin Mary in Christian literature.
Through her couplings with the devil (or with Adam, as his succubus), Lilith gave birth to one hundred demonic children a day (the one hundred children threatened with death by the three angels). In this way, Lilith was held responsible for populating the world with evil.
If you ask how Lilith herself, the first wife of Adam, became evil, the answer lies in her insubordination to her husband Adam. It is her independence from Adam, her position beyond the control of a male, that makes her "evil."
She is disobedient and like Eve, and indeed all women who are willful, she is perceived as posing a constant threat to the divinely ordered state of affairs defined by men.
Lilith is represented as a powerfully sexual woman against whom men and babies felt they had few defenses and, except for a few amulets, little protection. Much more so than Eve, Lilith is the personification female sexuality.
Her legend serves to demonstrate how, when unchecked, female sexuality is disruptive and destructive. Lilith highlights how women, beginning with Eve, use their sexuality to seduce men. She provides thereby a necessary sexual dimension, which is otherwise lacking, to the Genesis story which, when read in literal terms, portrays Eve not as some wicked femme fatale but as a naive and largely sexless fool. Only as a Lilith-like character could Eve be seen as a calculating, evil, seductress.
Lilith is referred to only once in the Old Testament. In the Darby translation of Isaiah 34:14 the original Hebrew word is rendered as "lilith"; according to Isaiah, when God's vengeance has turned the land into a wilderness, "there shall the beasts of the desert meet with the jackals, and the wild goat shall cry to his fellow; the lilith also shall settle there, and find for herself a place of rest." The same word is translated elsewhere, however, as "screech owl, "night creatures," "night monsters," and "night hag."
Although it has been suggested that the association with night stems from a similarity between the Sumero-Babylonian demon Lilitu and the Hebrew word laylah meaning "night," Lilith nonetheless seems to have been otherwise associated with darkness and night as a time of fear, vulnerability, and evil.
In her demonized form, Lilith is a frightening and threatening creature. Much more so than Eve, she personifies the real (sexual) power women exercise over men.
She represents the deeper, darker fear men have of women and female sexuality. Inasmuch as female sexuality, as a result of this fear, has been repressed and subjected to the severest controls in Western patriarchal society, so too has the figure of Lilith been kept hidden.
However, she lurks as a powerful unidentified presence, an unspoken name, in the minds of biblical commentators for whom Eve and Lilith become inextricably intertwined and blended into one person. Importantly, it is this Eve/Lilith amalgam which is used to identify women as the true source of evil in the world.
In the Apocryphal Testament of Reuben (one of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, ostensibly the twelve sons of Jacob), for example, it is explained that:
Women are evil, my children: because they have no power or strength to stand up against man, they use wiles and try to ensnare him by their charms; and man, whom woman cannot subdue by strength, she subdues by guile. (Testament of Reuben: V, 1-2, 5) References to Lilith in the Talmud describe her as a night demon with long hair (B. Erubin 100b) and as having a human likeness but with wings (B. Nidda 24b). In Rabbi Isaac ben Jacob ha-Kohen's "Treatise on the Emanations on the Left," written in Spain in the 13th century, she is described as having the form of a beautiful woman from her head to her waist, and "burning fire" from her waist down. Elsewhere, Rabbi Isaac equates her with the primordial serpent Leviathan.
Crudely drawn images of Lilith can be seen on amulets (see Magical or Prophylactic images of Lilith in incantation bowls and on amulets).
Lilith? Babylonian terra-cotta relief, c. 2000 BCE (Collection of Colonel James Colville)
A Babylonian terra-cotta relief dated to around 2000 BCE in the collection of Colonel Norman Corville has been identified as a representation of Lilith (the identification has been questioned by a number of scholars). The relief shows a nude woman with wings and a bird's taloned feet. She wears a hat composed of four pairs of horns and holds in each upraised hand a combined ring and rod (similar to an Egyptian shen ring amulet). She stands on two reclining lions and is flanked by owls.
Despite the fact that she is not officially recognized in the Christian tradition, in the Late Middle Ages she is occasionally identified with the serpent in Genesis 3 and shown accordingly with a woman's head and torso. For example, the bare-breasted woman with a snake's lower parts posed seductively in the branches of the tree between Adam and Eve in the scene of the temptation carved into the base of the trumeau in the left doorway of the West façade of the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris has been identified as Lilith.
Adam, Lilith, and Eve relief sculpture, c. 1210 CE Base of trumeau, left portal, West Façade, Notre Dame, Paris
EVE AND THE IDENTITY OF WOMEN Christopher L. C. E. Witcombe | Sweet Briar College
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689998
Date: March 10, 2010 at 18:45:02 From: Countrymarxist, Subject: (correction) Re: Adma had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
Lilith John Collier 1887 (The Atkinson Art Gallery, Southport, England)
Eve & Lilith In an effort to explain inconsistencies in the Old Testament, there developed in Jewish literature a complex interpretive system called the midrash which attempts to reconcile biblical contradictions and bring new meaning to the scriptural text.
Employing both a philological method and often an ingenious imagination, midrashic writings, which reached their height in the 2nd century CE, influenced later Christian interpretations of the Bible. Inconsistencies in the story of Genesis, especially the two separate accounts of creation, received particular attention. Later, beginning in the 13th century CE, such questions were also taken up in Jewish mystical literature known as the Kabbalah.
According to midrashic literature, Adam's first wife was not Eve but a woman named Lilith, who was created in the first Genesis account. Only when Lilith rebelled and abandoned Adam did God create Eve, in the second account, as a replacement. In an important 13th century Kabbalah text, the Sefer ha-Zohar ("The Book of Splendour") written by the Spaniard Moses de Leon (c. 1240-1305), it is explained that:
At the same time Jehovah created Adam, he created a woman, Lilith, who like Adam was taken from the earth. She was given to Adam as his wife. But there was a dispute between them about a matter that when it came before the judges had to be discussed behind closed doors. She spoke the unspeakable name of Jehovah and vanished. In the Alpha Betha of Ben Sira (Alphabetum Siracidis, or Sepher Ben Sira), an anonymous collection of midrashic proverbs probably compiled in the 11th century C.E., it is explained more explicitly that the conflict arose because Adam, as a way of asserting his authority over Lilith, insisted that she lie beneath him during sexual intercourse (23 A-B). Lilith, however, considering herself to be Adam's equal, refused, and after pronouncing the Ineffable Name (i.e. the magic name of God) flew off into the air.
Adam, distraught and no doubt also angered by her insolent behaviour, wanted her back. On Adam's request, God sent three angels, named Senoy, Sansenoy, and Semangelof, who found her in the Red Sea. Despite the threat from the three angels that if she didn't return to Adam one hundred of her sons would die every day, she refused, claiming that she was created expressly to harm newborn infants. However, she did swear that she would not harm any infant wearing an amulet with the images and/or names of the three angels on it.
At this point, the legend of Lilith as the "first Eve" merges with the earlier legend of Sumero-Babylonian origin, dating from around 3,500 BCE, of Lilith as a winged female demon who kills infants and endangers women in childbirth. In this role, she was one of several mazakim or "harmful spirits" known from incantation formulas preserved in Assyrian, Hebrew, and Canaanite inscriptions intended to protect against them. As a female demon, she is closely related to Lamashtu whose evilness included killing children, drinking the blood of men, and eating their flesh. Lamashtu also caused pregnant women to miscarry, disturbed sleep and brought nightmares.
In turn, Lamashtu is like another demonized female called Lamia, a Libyan serpent goddess, whose name is probably a Greek variant of Lamashtu. Like Lamashtu, Lamia also killed children. In the guise of a beautiful woman, she also seduced young men. In the Latin Vulgate Bible, Lamia is given as the translation of the Hebrew Lilith (and in other translations it is given as "screech owl" and "night monster").
It needs to be remembered that these demonic "women" are essentially personifications of unseen forces invented to account for otherwise inexplicable events and phenomena which occur in the real world. Lilith, Lamashtu, Lamia and other female demons like them are all associated with the death of children and especially with the death of newborn infants.
It may be easily imagined that they were held accountable for such things as Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS, also called crib death, or cot death) where an apparently healthy infant dies for no obvious reason. Cot death occurs almost always during sleep at night and is the most common cause of death of infants. Its cause still remains unknown.
By inventing evil spirits like Lilith, Lamashtu, and Lamia, parents were not only able to identify the enemy but also to know what they had to guard against. Amulets with the names of the three angels were intended to protect against the power of Lilith.
Lilith also personified licentiousness and lust. In the Christian Middle Ages she, or her female offspring, the lilim, became identified with succubae (the female counterparts of incubi) who would copulate with men in their sleep, causing them to have nocturnal emissions or "wet dreams."
Again, Lilith and her kind serve as a way of accounting for an otherwise inexplicable phenomenon among men. Today, 85 percent of all men experience "wet dreams" (the ejaculation of sperm while asleep) at some time in their lives, mostly during their teens and twenties and as often as once a month. In the Middle Ages, celibate monks would attempt to guard against these nocturnal visits by the lilith/succubus by sleeping with their hands crossed over their genitals and holding a crucifix.
Through the literature of the Kabbalah, Lilith became fixed in Jewish demonology where her primary role is that of strangler of children and a seducer of men. The Kabbalah further enhanced her demonic character by making her the partner of Samael (i.e. Satan) and queen of the realm of the forces of evil.
In this guise, she appears as the antagonistic negative counterpart of the Shekhinah ("Divine Presence"), the mother of the House of Israel. The Zohar repeatedly contrasts Lilith the unholy whorish woman with the Shekhinah as the holy, noble, and capable woman. In much the same way, Eve the disobedient, lustful sinner is contrasted with the obedient and holy Virgin Mary in Christian literature.
Through her couplings with the devil (or with Adam, as his succubus), Lilith gave birth to one hundred demonic children a day (the one hundred children threatened with death by the three angels). In this way, Lilith was held responsible for populating the world with evil.
If you ask how Lilith herself, the first wife of Adam, became evil, the answer lies in her insubordination to her husband Adam. It is her independence from Adam, her position beyond the control of a male, that makes her "evil."
She is disobedient and like Eve, and indeed all women who are willful, she is perceived as posing a constant threat to the divinely ordered state of affairs defined by men.
Lilith is represented as a powerfully sexual woman against whom men and babies felt they had few defenses and, except for a few amulets, little protection. Much more so than Eve, Lilith is the personification female sexuality.
Her legend serves to demonstrate how, when unchecked, female sexuality is disruptive and destructive. Lilith highlights how women, beginning with Eve, use their sexuality to seduce men. She provides thereby a necessary sexual dimension, which is otherwise lacking, to the Genesis story which, when read in literal terms, portrays Eve not as some wicked femme fatale but as a naive and largely sexless fool. Only as a Lilith-like character could Eve be seen as a calculating, evil, seductress.
Lilith is referred to only once in the Old Testament. In the Darby translation of Isaiah 34:14 the original Hebrew word is rendered as "lilith"; according to Isaiah, when God's vengeance has turned the land into a wilderness, "there shall the beasts of the desert meet with the jackals, and the wild goat shall cry to his fellow; the lilith also shall settle there, and find for herself a place of rest." The same word is translated elsewhere, however, as "screech owl, "night creatures," "night monsters," and "night hag."
Although it has been suggested that the association with night stems from a similarity between the Sumero-Babylonian demon Lilitu and the Hebrew word laylah meaning "night," Lilith nonetheless seems to have been otherwise associated with darkness and night as a time of fear, vulnerability, and evil.
In her demonized form, Lilith is a frightening and threatening creature. Much more so than Eve, she personifies the real (sexual) power women exercise over men.
She represents the deeper, darker fear men have of women and female sexuality. Inasmuch as female sexuality, as a result of this fear, has been repressed and subjected to the severest controls in Western patriarchal society, so too has the figure of Lilith been kept hidden.
However, she lurks as a powerful unidentified presence, an unspoken name, in the minds of biblical commentators for whom Eve and Lilith become inextricably intertwined and blended into one person. Importantly, it is this Eve/Lilith amalgam which is used to identify women as the true source of evil in the world.
In the Apocryphal Testament of Reuben (one of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, ostensibly the twelve sons of Jacob), for example, it is explained that:
Women are evil, my children: because they have no power or strength to stand up against man, they use wiles and try to ensnare him by their charms; and man, whom woman cannot subdue by strength, she subdues by guile. (Testament of Reuben: V, 1-2, 5) References to Lilith in the Talmud describe her as a night demon with long hair (B. Erubin 100b) and as having a human likeness but with wings (B. Nidda 24b). In Rabbi Isaac ben Jacob ha-Kohen's "Treatise on the Emanations on the Left," written in Spain in the 13th century, she is described as having the form of a beautiful woman from her head to her waist, and "burning fire" from her waist down. Elsewhere, Rabbi Isaac equates her with the primordial serpent Leviathan.
Crudely drawn images of Lilith can be seen on amulets (see Magical or Prophylactic images of Lilith in incantation bowls and on amulets).
Lilith? Babylonian terra-cotta relief, c. 2000 BCE (Collection of Colonel James Colville)
A Babylonian terra-cotta relief dated to around 2000 BCE in the collection of Colonel Norman Corville has been identified as a representation of Lilith (the identification has been questioned by a number of scholars). The relief shows a nude woman with wings and a bird's taloned feet. She wears a hat composed of four pairs of horns and holds in each upraised hand a combined ring and rod (similar to an Egyptian shen ring amulet). She stands on two reclining lions and is flanked by owls.
Despite the fact that she is not officially recognized in the Christian tradition, in the Late Middle Ages she is occasionally identified with the serpent in Genesis 3 and shown accordingly with a woman's head and torso. For example, the bare-breasted woman with a snake's lower parts posed seductively in the branches of the tree between Adam and Eve in the scene of the temptation carved into the base of the trumeau in the left doorway of the West façade of the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris has been identified as Lilith.
Adam, Lilith, and Eve relief sculpture, c. 1210 CE Base of trumeau, left portal, West Façade, Notre Dame, Paris
EVE AND THE IDENTITY OF WOMEN Christopher L. C. E. Witcombe | Sweet Briar College
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689988
Date: March 10, 2010 at 17:30:26 From: Countrymarxist, Subject: Re: Adam had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
Funk and Wagnalls Encyclopedia 1949-1950 Volume 1, Page 64
ADAM AND EVE
.. In Rabbinical lore and Moslem theology there is a tendency to deify an ideal ancestor. The Rabbinical Adam is a gigantic being reaching from earth to heaven. God caused a sleep to fall on Adam, and removed a portion of every limb. Thus he lost his vast stature, but remained perfect in every part.
His first wife was Lilith; but she fled from him when Eve was created. The happiness of the human pair excited envy among the angels, and the seraph Sammuel tempted them to their fall. According to the Koran, all the angels paid homage to Adam, except Eblic, who, on account of his refusal, was expelled from Paradise. To gratify his revenge, he tempted them to sin.
Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, 2 Volumes Hendrickson Publishers Volume 1, page 48
"Divorce in Magic"
An excellent example of the legal nature of magic occurs in certain Aramaic incantation bowls that take the form of a legal divorce writ, a 'get', against the demons, usually Lilith. These texts include the opening formula of the Jewish divorce writ, combined with a reference to a rabbit to authorize the procedure, and the identification of the demon Lilith by name. The Lilith, cited as the adulterous wife, was forbidden to return to the house, in accordance with the usual rules of divorce, which applied to the magical as well as the normal situation.
Although there is no exact parallel from ancient Babylonia to an actual magical divorce writ, there is a corpus of magical texts directed against the demon Ardat Lilî, the equivalent of the Aramaic Lilith. In these incantations the Ardat Lilî a dangerous succubus, seeks sexual union with a human victim to compensate for her premature death, without either spouse or child. "The maiden is like a woman who never had intercourse. . . like a woman who was never deflowered. The maiden is (one who) never experienced sex in her husband's lap, . . . never peeled off her clothes on her husband's lap, . . . no nice looking lad ever loosened her (garment) clasp . . . who had no milk in her breasts, but only bitter liquid comes out. Who never fulfilled (her) sexuality nor satisfied (her) desires in a man's lap." The ritual in these incantations involves making an image of a female and male demon, dressing them, and conducting a marriage ceremony in which the demonic images are said to offer wedding vows to each other: "May you be my wife. . .
May you be my husband." The sexual imagery is implicit in the accompanying phrase that "he brought her pleasure like the garden fruit. . . she brought him pleasure like the garden fruit." The result is that the attentions of the demons are directed toward each other and away from possible human companionship.
The descriptions of this demon as the spirit of a young girl who died without spouse or children finds resonance in Jewish midrashic literature. Lilith in Jewish legend was Adam's first wife, who was divorced before conceiving children and consequently takes her revenge on the children of Eve; in this role Lilith assumes the characteristics of another Mesopotamian demon, Lamashtu, who attacks babies at childbirth.
Date: March 10, 2010 at 18:43:13 From: Countrymarxist, Subject: (Correction) Re: Adam had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
Funk and Wagnalls Encyclopedia 1949-1950 Volume 1, Page 64
ADAM AND EVE
.. In Rabbinical lore and Moslem theology there is a tendency to deify an ideal ancestor. The Rabbinical Adam is a gigantic being reaching from earth to heaven. God caused a sleep to fall on Adam, and removed a portion of every limb. Thus he lost his vast stature, but remained perfect in every part.
His first wife was Lilith; but she fled from him when Eve was created. The happiness of the human pair excited envy among the angels, and the seraph Sammuel tempted them to their fall. According to the Koran, all the angels paid homage to Adam, except Eblic, who, on account of his refusal, was expelled from Paradise. To gratify his revenge, he tempted them to sin.
Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, 2 Volumes Hendrickson Publishers Volume 1, page 48
"Divorce in Magic"
An excellent example of the legal nature of magic occurs in certain Aramaic incantation bowls that take the form of a legal divorce writ, a 'get', against the demons, usually Lilith. These texts include the opening formula of the Jewish divorce writ, combined with a reference to a rabbit to authorize the procedure, and the identification of the demon Lilith by name. The Lilith, cited as the adulterous wife, was forbidden to return to the house, in accordance with the usual rules of divorce, which applied to the magical as well as the normal situation.
Although there is no exact parallel from ancient Babylonia to an actual magical divorce writ, there is a corpus of magical texts directed against the demon Ardat Lilî, the equivalent of the Aramaic Lilith. In these incantations the Ardat Lilî a dangerous succubus, seeks sexual union with a human victim to compensate for her premature death, without either spouse or child. "The maiden is like a woman who never had intercourse. . . like a woman who was never deflowered. The maiden is (one who) never experienced sex in her husband's lap, . . . never peeled off her clothes on her husband's lap, . . . no nice looking lad ever loosened her (garment) clasp . . . who had no milk in her breasts, but only bitter liquid comes out. Who never fulfilled (her) sexuality nor satisfied (her) desires in a man's lap." The ritual in these incantations involves making an image of a female and male demon, dressing them, and conducting a marriage ceremony in which the demonic images are said to offer wedding vows to each other: "May you be my wife. . .
May you be my husband." The sexual imagery is implicit in the accompanying phrase that "he brought her pleasure like the garden fruit. . . she brought him pleasure like the garden fruit." The result is that the attentions of the demons are directed toward each other and away from possible human companionship.
The descriptions of this demon as the spirit of a young girl who died without spouse or children finds resonance in Jewish midrashic literature. Lilith in Jewish legend was Adam's first wife, who was divorced before conceiving children and consequently takes her revenge on the children of Eve; in this role Lilith assumes the characteristics of another Mesopotamian demon, Lamashtu, who attacks babies at childbirth.
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689996
Date: March 10, 2010 at 18:22:43 From: Muslim, Subject: Re: Adam had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
I would have you know that the thing they call Kabalah is a very powerful thing and incorporates magic from Babylon.. given to mankind as a test from those angels (Ha'rut and Ma'rut) they were giving out this knowledge warning of its harm, but those Jews who were opposed to Solomon took the knowledge (and they have failed the test) Very real and powerful stuff this magic... Do not get involved with that.. Stay clear !!!
With regard to Satan, he is from among the Jinn, and NOT an Angel... However, he lived among the Angels because of his high stature before he rebelled. he rebelled when Adam was created.
With regard to the Muslim understanding... There is Adam and there is Eve (Hawaah)... Adam was the first, and yes he was huge !! About 60 arms lengths tall (our arms lengths)... Adam and Hawaah had many children not just two boys... You can learn more from the video below...
But I warn you.. Stay away from that mystical magic !!!
Peace. Spread LOVE, PEACE, and Knowledge throughout the World
Date: March 10, 2010 at 18:54:53 From: Countrymarxist, Subject: Re: Adam had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
Muslim is telling us the Adam was a giant or what?
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689982
Date: March 10, 2010 at 16:53:00 From: Dancer, Subject: Re: Adma had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
Boy ! Now I see where Big Drum Nation was coming from in its Editorial on TS Monday the 8th. MISOGYNY eh ? The myth,stories of Lilith scared me breathless . Don't mess with the female. Lawd. ..... Believe it or not , this morning, on the beach , a man married over 40 years (or more) i think , called his wife a witch with a straight and serious face.
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689976
Date: March 10, 2010 at 16:25:42 From: Psychic, Subject: Re: Adam had two Wives? Eve & Lilith?
Coming on the heels of International Women's Day...I found this to be an enlightening read. Thanks for posting.