Table of Contents In Talmud and Midrash. Middle Ages and Modern Times. Female demon. Of the three Assyrian demons Lilu, Lilit, and Ardat Lilit, the second is referred to in Isa. xxxiv. 14. Schrader ("Jahrb. fr Protestantische Theologie," i. 128)takes Lilith to be a goddess of the night; she is said to have been worshiped by the Jewish exiles in Babylon (Levy, in "Z. D. M. G." ix. 470, 484). Sayce ("Hibbert Lectures," pp. 145 et seq.), Fossey ("La Magie Assyrienne," pp. 37 et seq.), and others think that "Lilith" is not connected with the Hebrew "layil" (night), but that it is the name of a demon of the storm, and this view is supported by the cuneiform inscriptions quoted by them. It must, however, be assumed that the resemblance to the Semitic "layil" materially changed the conception of Lilith among the Semites, and especially among the Jews. No definite conclusions can be drawn from the passage in Isaiah, where it is said of the devastated palaces of Edom that wild animals shall dwell in them "and the satyr shall cry to his fellow; the screech-owl also shall rest there, and find for herself a place of rest" (Isa. xxxiv. 14; see Cheyne's note ad loc.). Baudissin connects Lilith with Zech. v. 9.
the guise of a beautiful woman seduced a poor Jew of Worms (Grunwald, l.c. ii. 30 et seq.). As she was eager to seize new-born infants, mother and child were provided with amulets, which since early times were regarded as an efficient protection against magic and demons; Lilith is the chief figure on the "childbirth tablets" still hung on the walls of the lying-in room in the East and in eastern Europe (see Amulets). The name "Lilith" occurs also in non-Jewish superstitions (Lammert, "Volksmedicin," p. 170; Grunwald, l.c. vii., col. 2, n. 4). The conception that she was Adam's first wife (comp. Gen. R. xxiv.; Yer. 'Er. 18b) appears to have been spread through Buxtorf's "Lexicon Talmudicum," s.v. Lilith is a clear instance of the persistence of popular superstitious beliefs. Bibliography: W. M. Menzies Alexander, Demoniac Possession in the N. T. pp. 15-16, 26, 44, 55, Edinburgh, 1902; Bacher, Lilith, Knigin von Smargad, in Monatsschrift, 1870, xix. 187-189; W. W. Baudissin, Studien zur Semitischen Religionsgesch, i. 128, Leipsic, 1876; Bar Bahlul's Syrisches Wrterb.; G. Brecher, Das Transcendentale, etc., pp. 47, 50, 54, Vienna, 1850; Eisenmenger, Entdecktes Judenthum, ii. 413 et seq.; C. Fossey, La Magie Assyrienne, pp. 26, 37 et seq., Paris, 1902; M. Grunwald, Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft fr Jdische Volkskunde, ii. 68, 74; v. 10, 62; vii. 104; F. Hommel, Vorsemitische Kultur, p. 367; idem, Die Semiten, etc., p. 368, Leipsic, 1881; A. Kohut, Ueber die Jdische Angelologie und Dmonologie, pp. 86-89, ib. 1866; M. Schwab, Vocabulaire de l'Angelologie, p. 162, Paris, 1897; idem, Les Coupes Magiques et l'Hydromancie dans l'Antiquit Orientale, in Tr. Soc. Bibl. Arch. April, 1890; idem, Coupes d Inscriptions Magiques, ib. June, 1891.