Saturday, February 18, 2012

In The Beginning, there was Lilith

         If I truly am to look at relations between myths, what is a better place to start than the beginning? After all, myths have been around for thousands of years. And there is one myth, 4,000 years old, that many people still believe today. The myth of the demon seductress, Lilith.


Lilith - John Collier, 1887 
                                                                            
         One could wonder why I am starting with this myth. There are two answers. One, most people reading this are familiar with the tale of Adam and Eve, in which Lilith makes an appearance. Having prior knowledge of a subject will increase your interest. And two, every culture has had a version of this evil witch.
          The poem "Lilith" by Dante Rossetti,1868, refers to her as the beautiful, yet evil, witch Adam was married to before Eve. This is how many people remember her today.But we must look to her origns. The earliest surviving mention of Lilith's name appears in Gilgamesh and the Huluppu-Tree, a Sumerian epic poem found on a tablet at Ur and dating from approximately 2000 B.C.E. In one episode, "after heaven and earth had separated and man had been created," Gilgamesh rushes to assist Inanna, goddess of love and war. In her garden near the Euphrates River, Inanna lovingly tends a willow tree. However, Inanna's plans are nearly thwarted, however, when three demons possess the tree. One of them is Lilith: "Inanna, to her chagrin, found herself unable to realize her hopes. For in the meantime a dragon had set up its nest at the base of the tree, the Zu-bird had placed his young in its crown, and in its midst the demoness Lilith had built her house." Amulets and incantations were used to counter the dark powers of this spirit who preyed on pregnant women and infants.
          Lilith next migrated to the world of the ancient Hittites, Egyptians, Israelites and Greeks. She makes a solitary appearance in the Bible, as a wilderness demon shunned by the prophet Isaiah. In the Renaissance, Michelangelo portrayed Lilith as a half-woman, half-serpent, coiled around the Tree of Knowledge. Today, feminists celebrate her bold struggle for independence from Adam. This overview of literary and religious interpretations of the Lilith figure traces "her journey from Babylonian mythology, through the Bible, to medieval lore and modern literature.", and makes her an ideal figure to start the journey of mythological connections.

          ANALYSIS: Lilith was a figure created to represent chaos, seduction and ungodliness. Her feud with Adam shows the neverending battle of the sexes. These immortal values caried her form through millenia, whether it was winged or scaled.

          REFLECTION QUESTION: Why was the message of chaos and seduction so important to have the exact same entity, down to the name Lilith itself, last for over 4,000 years?

For more information you can read http://sks.sirs.com/cgi-bin/hst-article-display?id=SFL2086-0-4692&artno=0000144364&type=ART&shfilter=U&key=Mythology&title=Lilith%3A%20Seductress%2C%20Heroine%20or%20Murderer%3F&res=N&ren=Y&gov=Y&lnk=Y&ic=N#citation.

CITATION: Gaines, Janet Howe. "Lilith: Seductress, Heroine or Murderer?." Bible Review. Oct. 2001: 12+. SIRS Renaissance. Web. 18 Feb 2012.

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