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| Lilith |
| Lilith is an ancient goddess from the Middle Eastern region of the world. In ancient Sumeria she was portrayed as having the wings and claws of a bird. In some cases she is depicted as having the body of a serpent or as being a sperpent with the head and breasts of a woman. Her early goddess names may have been Ninlil, Lillake, Belil-ili, or Belilil. It was however known that she was the "hand of Inanna" and an agricultural goddess. She lived in the trunk of the Huluppu tree. She also aided women in childbirth and nursed infants. She was associated with the dark moon, trees, serpents, crossroads, and owls. Over time however she has gone by many names and fulfilled many roles. In her modern day incantation however she is a demoness in most cases. Eventually, Jewish patriarchry took over much of the region in which Lilith was worshiped. Because the new faith could not simply make her disappear, she was intergrated into their faith as a demoness. She was made the first wife of Adam, fashioned from the earth just as he was. She was his equal, and refused to let him dominate her sexually and would not lie on her back and allow him to mount her. Adam did not listen to her however and forced himself upon her at which time Lilith used the secret name of God and flew from the Garden of Eden. Then God made Eve (from Adam's rib) and unlike Lilith she was submissive to Adam. Lilith has been depicted as Eve's foe in some ways. Some scholars even point to the serpent which convinces Eve to eat of the tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil as Lilith. However, this would imply that Lilith was attempting to help and possibly empower Eve, not hurt her. After Adam and Eve were exiled from Eden, Adam went though a peroid of celibacy. During this time Lilith i said to have caused nocturnal emissions from Adam and collected his semen to impregnate herself with it and give birth to demons. (This is the first time we see Lilith as a sucubus.) The children Lilith begat in this manner were called Lilim or Lilin or "night-demons." As Lilith once protected mothers and infants the Hebrew myths made her a demoness who murdered infants in their sleep and caused abortions. It was believed that when a baby smiled or laughed in it's sleep it was being entertained by Lilith. To remedy this the parnets of the child would quickly and (gently) hit the child on the nose to distract the child from the goddess. Baby boys were in danger of being snatched away by Lilith until they were protected by circumcision but baby girls were left unprotected much longer. There have been bowls found in ancient Jewish cities with incantations to protect infants from Lilith. She was also said to come to children in the form of an owl and drink their blood. The modern interpretation of Lilith relies heavily on sexuality. In the ancient world as the Hand of Inanna she gathered men from the streets and lead them to the temples of Inanna. While there they would take part in sexuality rituals and enjoy the company of sacred prosititutes. Later, during the Jewish interpretation (which actually first appeared in the Middle Ages in the Alphabet of Ben Sera) she was the first wife of Adam and insisted not to be submissive during lovemaking. Then she was turned into the succubus who brings men preverse dreams causing them to ejaculate in the night. Much of our recent vampire lore associates Lilith with vampires. The only vampiric trait of Lilith is that in Jewish myth she was said to suck the blood of infants, and if she could not kill the amount of infants she needed to she would kill thousands of her own children. These are modern myths and the ancient Lilith in reality had little to do with vampires or vampirism. |