A Summary
of Evidences in the Bible that Support the Existence of Lilith
To put forth a coherent argument supporting Lilith's existence based on
Genesis, I have collected together 19
Biblical evidences I have discovered that support her case. Although each piece of evidence considered individually makes an
inconclusive argument, when they are weighed together as a whole, they form a cogent and hefty case
for such a conclusion. The first eight
support the notion of a woman created
before Eve whom was in rivalry with Adam. The next seven support the notion that this first created woman was the
Serpent. The final two establish that
there was a demoness named Lilith who
matched all of Lilith’s legend’s critical features and that this demoness was
linked to the curses of the bitter water
trial. Not all facets of the Lilith
legend are supported by the collected evidences,
but most are. Many of the remaining
unsupported elements of the legend are easily assumed extrapolations of events that must
have taken place. The evidences are
briefly discussed below. They will be covered in more detail in
following sections.
1. There are creation accounts of two
women in Genesis. The first woman is
made from dust at the same time as
Adam. The second is created later from
Adam’s side. The creation account of the second woman, Eve, comes in Ge
2:21-25. Those passages clearly indicate
Eve was created from Adam’s side. The first woman’s creation is told three
times, once in Ge 1:26-29, again in Ge 2:4-8, and briefly recapped in Ge 5:1-2. All three accounts imply both Adam and this
woman were created at the same time
using dust (and muck) from the ground. Although a cursory English reading of the second account appears to show this woman missing,
there are numerous evidences in the literal Hebrew that a woman named Adamah was created with
Adam at this time, and that her body was watered by a mist.
2. A careful reading of the Hebrew in the detailed creation account of
Adam reveals that a woman was created at the same time. The passages declare that they are documenting the creation of “the generations of the heavens and of the
earth”. This odd phraseology refers to
two rival generations being created at that
time. Those generations are that of “the
man” (Adam) and that of “the woman” (i. e. Adamah or Lilith). Adam’s generation would be that of the earth,
taking after the likeness of God’s animating
breath from heaven. Lilith’s generations
would be that of the heavens, taking after the likeness of the fallen Watchers and Lucifer’s
animating waters. These waters came from
a mist breaking up through the ground
during Adam’s creation (Ge 2:6).
3. In the first and third creation
accounts of a man and woman in Ge 1:26-29 and Ge 5:1-2, the passages clearly states that when the male and
female were created, only the male was created in God’s image. The female not being created in God’s image is consistent with
Lilith. She was created by God, but not in His image, for a demonic
mist arouse from the ground and animated her in it’s image instead (Ge 2:6). Note that Eve would bear God’s image, for she
was taken out of Adam’s side.
4. Conflicting commands of God to the two
women of the creation accounts above further indicate they must be different individuals. Ge 1:26-29 states that after the first woman
and Adam were created, God gave freedom
to both to eat the fruit of every tree. All trees were allowed. However, Eve could have never received permission to
eat of every tree. This is because after
Adam was moved to the Garden but before
Eve was created in Ge 2:18-25, God warns Adam that he may no longer eat of every tree. God warns that he could not eat of the tree
of knowledge and that he must “guard”
the garden (Ge 2:15-17). Thus the
prohibition against eating all trees is already in place before Eve’s creation. She cannot be the woman referenced in Ge
1:26-29 whom God grants permission to
eat of all trees.
5. In Ge 5:2 God gave a single name “Adam”
to denote both the female and male. This
single name supports a dual simultaneous
creation from dust for Adam and his first mate. It also implies that the name of
Adam’s first female would be Adamah, as the feminine form of Adam comes is
adamah, which means “ground” and is the
root from which the name Adam is derived. This supports the word-play in Ge
2:6 which states that the face of the Adamah (i.e. Lilith) was watered by the
mist. This is consistent with the legend of Lilith’s creation from muck
and mud.
6. Lilith explains why God rescinded
permission to eat of every tree; why the tree of knowledge came to exist; and why Adam had to guard the
garden.
7. Lilith explains Adam’s lonely state in
Ge 2:18. As the literal Hebrew of Ge
2:18 confirms, God did not create Adam
alone, but rather Adam “became alone” after some time. Lilith explains how Adam became alone. She also explains the timing of Eve’s creation after Adam’s unsuccessful
search among the beasts of the field
(which includes Lilith) for a mate.
8. In Ge 2:18 the literal Hebrew
states that Eve was made as a helpmate for Adam “like one shown before him”. This odd phraseology implies a woman companion was physically shown to
Adam before Eve existed. It even implies that Eve was made as a
replacement for this first woman. This
is all consistent with Lilith.
9. After Eve’s creation in Ge 2:23, Adam awakes and exclaims upon seeing
her, “This time is this!” The Hebrew term for “this time”, hapa’am, is
used when an event repeats and the subsequent event is being compared to the first. It could perhaps best be understood in
English as “at this iteration”. So Adam could understood as saying, “At this
iteration is this!”, in reference to Eve standing before him. Adam’s
use of this word implies that he is comparing Eve’s creation to a previous
creation, namely Lilith’s. The point of his comparison is that “this
time” the result was “bone from my bone and flesh from my flesh”, as opposed to Lilith’s
creation from dust, or rather mud.
10. The Serpent was not a snake, but rather
the most cunning mammal. This is
consistent with the serpent being
Lilith. Ge 3:1 clearly states that the
serpent was the most cunning “beast of the field”. In
Genesis this term refers to higher mammals that are soulish creatures with
developed minds and emotions. The term does not apply to reptiles or lower
animals. Lilith best fits the unique description as the most cunning of these
mammals. She is considered a beast and
not human because she does not bear the
spirit and image of God, but rather that of her father Lucifer. And with the mind of man and animating spirit of Lucifer, she is certainly
the most cunning.
11. The Hebrew noun translated “Serpent”,
nachash, is strongly suggestive of a human speaking through an indwelling demonic spirit. This is consistent with Lilith. Nachash comes from the verb root nechash, which means ‘to divine’ or
‘divination’. The root originally meant
‘to hiss’ or ‘to whisper’. It came to mean ‘to divine’ because it was used
to describe the whispers of the soothsayers, whom obtain their powers through the whispering
voice of an indwelling demonic spirit. These inhabited soothsayers were
predominately women. The only creature
recorded in the Bible as experiencing nechash
divination is man. In the Bible the noun
nachash (“serpent”) always refers to a demonically inhabited creature of cursing. If the Serpent is human, Lilith provides the
only possible origin of that human.
12. Lilith best explains
Leviathan, which is the most famous nachash Serpent of the Bible. Leviathan
is commonly recognized as Lucifer in the form of the Serpent of the
garden. Leviathan is described In Job 26:13 and Isa 27:1 as a
winged Serpent fleeing from before God and dwelling in the seas. This matches Lilith’s legend of fleeing on wing from the garden and her
subsequent oceanic abode. 1 Enoch confirms that Leviathan dwells in the
seas, and adds that Leviathan is female. This again matches Lilith. Psalm 74:14 speaks of God crushing the heads
of Leviathan. This matches God’s curse on the Serpent in Genesis that Eve’s seed
in the form of Messiah would crush the head of the Serpent.
13. Job 26:13 implies the Serpent
Leviathan’s creation was analogous to that of Adam – that it was fashioned by God through twisting and
manipulating of earth into a golem. This
similar creation supports the notion
that the Serpent was created at the same time as Adam and in a similar
fashion. This is consistent with the Serpent being the
first woman, Lilith, created from dust of the earth.
14. The Serpent’s extreme intelligence
and ability to speak is best explained by it being human. The
Lilith legend provides the only real explanation for the origins of this
human. The general tenor of Genesis implies that the Serpent’s
intelligence and ability to speak is not supernatural or unexpected, but rather the natural created
state of the being. It certainly did not
surprise Adam or Eve to see the Serpent
talking. It is inconceivable that they
would express no surprise over seeing an
animal speaking. The Zohar (Pekudei:
Passage 454) also holds that the Serpent’s ability to speak, its cunningness, and its power of seduction
were all native to it. Samael (Lucifer)
rode the Serpent and used these innate
abilities to his advantage.
15. Job 26:13 and Isa 27:1 speak
of a continual and eternal connection between Lucifer and the Serpent Leviathan. This is best explained by the Serpent being
fathered of Lucifer and animated in his
likeness, because the Serpent’s habitation or possession by Lucifer would be a
temporary and reversible condition. A continual and eternal connection between
Lucifer and the Serpent cannot be achieved
by mere spiritual habitation. Demonic
spirits can be exorcized from their host. The Lilith legend provides an
explanation for this irreversible fusing event with the Serpent. Lucifer became the animating father spirit of the Serpent
Lilith when his mist broke through from the depths of the earth and watered the ground of her
creation. Lucifer became her fathering
spirit just as God had become Adam’s
fathering spirit, and Lucifer’s spirit could no more be separated from Lilith
than could God’s spirit be separated
from Adam.
16. The strong parallels between
God’s curses laid out against Eve and the Serpent in Ge 3:15 imply that the Serpent, like Eve, was a woman
and a would-be mother. Both were said to
be the source of two rival seeds. The Serpent’s seed would bruise the heal of
Eve’s seed, but Eve’s seed would crush
the head of the Serpent.
17. The curses handed out to the
Serpent and to Eve in Ge 3:14-16 are the same as those of the bitter water trial for the wayward adulterous
wife in Nu 5:10-31. The Serpent’s curses
match those of the adulterous wife, and
Eve’s curse in childbirth matches that experienced by the innocent woman of the trial. The Serpent, in the role of the defiled Sotah, eats dust and is cursed
in her belly, and she shall be slain by
the promised seed of the innocent woman. Eve, as the innocent woman in the trial, shall temporarily endure the curse of pain in
childbirth, but she shall be saved by her seed. This strong parallelism further
solidifies the identification of the Serpent as an adulterous female whom has gone astray from under her husband, Adam.
18. Isa 34 describes a demon named
“Lilith” as a deadly birdlike creature with wings and as the slayer of stray younglings. A snake makes a nest with Lilith and is
innately fused with her, such that the
two are considered one being. She dwells
in the midst of the sea and shares her abode with certain angels cast out of heaven. In a day of cursing and judgment, the waters
of her abode whither such that streams
of water become molten tar, and the dust of the earth becomes burning
brimstone. Isaiah’s entire description of Lilith matches
her legend. The withering waters and
fiery curses mirror a bitter water
curse, with which the spirit of Lilith is associated.
19. In Proverbs 30 a demoness
titled Alukah is described as having a mystical power like that of the bitter water cursing agent in a Sotah
trial, which is the spirit of Lilith. When two type of barren women are
given over to the power of Alukah’s curse, two difference outcomes are
possible. For the woman who survives the ordeal, Alukah’s curses
somehow grant her a promised seed, but to the other barren woman of the trial, Alukah brings
the curses of death. In Rabbinic
tradition Alukah’s rich and detailed
mythos matches enumerable aspects of Lilith. Alukah was the mother of alukah, which are female vampires called estries. Common attributes between alukah and the
spirit of Lilith includes: 1) both had
winged flight and a birdlike appearance, 2) both engaged in the murder of children, 3) both of their powers were
activated by unleashing their hair, 4) both of their cursed powers could be revitalized by deceitful
eating, 5) both were constrained by an oath, 6) saying “amen” concerning either women was dangerous, 7) the
death or banishment of both was effectively brought about by filling her mouth with earth.