Where did the idea of Lillith, Adam's first wife, come from?

Question

I'm reading the Chronicles of Narnia for the first time and I got to the part where the Beavers explain that Lillith was Adam's first wife, but their children weren't human. I've heard of Lillith before but I can't remember where. Any help would be appreciated.

Answer 1

Lilith
In the Babylonian tradition, there is a triad of demons with whom Lilith is associated. The male is called Lilu, and the two females are Lilitu, a frigid, barren, & husbandless demon who roamed the night searching for men to seduce or drink their blood, and Ardat Lili, the 'maid of desolation.'

Lilith is thought be the demon of waste places who originally lived in the garden of the Sumerian goddess, Innana, queen of heaven. She is mentioned only briefly in the Hebrew Bible in Isaiah 34:14.

In Jewish traditions, Lilith was created with Adam from the dust of the earth, & became his first wife. She was stubborn, though, & refused to be subservient to her husband. Instead of becoming Adam's servant, she left him & was turned out of Paradise. However, before God created Eve, He sent 3 angels to try to convince Lilith to return to Adam. She refused, & God cursed her by sentencing 100 of her offspring to die each day. After her expulsion from Paradise, however, she slept once more with Adam, & bore the Shedim, Lilin, & Rauchin.

Later, in Kabbalistic circles, Lilith became the mistress of Sammael.

It is mistakenly thought that Lilith's name was derived from the Hebrew word lailah, which means 'night.' This was probably derived from the similarity of the two words, and the idea that Lilith was mostly active at night.

Answer 2

Squishy and Bobby Jim... Yeah, that's what I've heard...

An old Hebrew story that God created mankind as a funky 2-faced hermaphrodite- the male facing one way, the female facing the other. God then split the two, creating Adam and Lillith. She didn't want to submit to Adam's authority or be under him during sex, so God sent her away and created Eve from Adam's rib.

After that it gets kinda fuzzy as to what happened to Lillith. Either she went all psycho stalker-chick and harrassed Adam, and God destroyed her or she just went and hung out with Satan, becoming the mother of demons or vampires.... I'm not really sure.

According to some writings, she did become jealous of the human race. When she gets the chance, she supposedly takes the life of babies and women giving birth.... not a pleasant person, sometimes appearing as a harpy (body of a bird- usually a scavenger- and face of a woman.

Answer 3

In Genesis, Adam's wife was both created from dust, or created out of his rib. Two different accounts. Some of the early books of the bible that have been omitted named Lillith as his first wife that was created from dust. The current bible took out most of the story and changed the name to Eve, so that it would coincide sort of with the rest of the story.

Answer 4

Lillith comes from ancient Jewish folklore.
She was presumably Adam's first wife, but refused to submit to Adam's authority over her.
Lillith is not mentioned at all in the Biblical record.

Answer 5

Hebrew oral tradition.

They never actually had kids. They got into a scuffle over who got to be on top, and God sent Lillith away. She then became the mother of She-demons.

Answer 6

I thought it was from the JW's, but as I skimmed the answers here it looks like maybe from Jewish folklore. I don't know. I've heard something about Lillith too but never asked. I'm glad you did.

Answer 7

In ancient Hebrew texts she is Adam's first wife. She may even be older than that, the Sumero-Babylonian goddess Belit-ili, or Baalat to the Canaanites.

In Jewish mythology, she was Adams first wife. She refused to be sexually submissive to him - wasn't a fan of "the missionary position", so she flew away from him. Adam asked god to help out. He sent an angel to convince her to come back. She refused and became a demon who steals men's sperm at nights, has unnatural demon babies and steals human babies.

Like Eve, I think she was framed.

Answer 8

Ancient fragments of a Judain book "The Alphabet of Ben Sira"

Answer 9

For most Westerners we have picked up smatterings of her stories from Judaic Apocrypha (Jewish stories that are considered important to scholars but are not canon for ALL common people to read).

Many anthropologists claim a link to the Babylonian demi-goddess of the North Wind (causer of crib death).

Answer 10

Mesopotamia - like much of the Hebrew mythology.

Read "The Hebrew Goddess" by Raphael Patai.