What is "lilith"

Lilith \Lilith\ n. a female demon who attacks children.

female evil spirit, in medieval Hebrew folklore the first wife of Adam, from Hebrew Lilith, from Akkad. Lilitu, which is connected by folk etymology with Hebrew laylah "night."

Lilith ( Lîlîṯ) is a figure in Jewish mythology, developed earliest in the Babylonian Talmud (3rd to 5th centuries CE). The character is generally thought to derive in part from a historically far earlier class of female demons (lilītu) in Mesopotamian religion, found in cuneiform texts of Sumer, Akkad, Assyria, and Babylonia.

Evidence in later Jewish materials is plentiful, but little information has survived relating to the original Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian and Babylonian view of these demons. While the connection is almost universally agreed upon, recent scholarship has disputed the relevance of two sources previously used to connect the Jewish lilith to an Akkadian lilītu—the Gilgamesh appendix and the Arslan Tash amulets. (See below for discussion of the two problematic sources.)

In Hebrew-language texts, the term lilith or lilit (translated as "night creatures", "night monster", "night hag", or "screech owl") first occurs in a list of animals in Isaiah 34:11, either in singular or plural form according to variations in the earliest manuscripts. In the Dead Sea Scrolls' Songs of the Sage the term first occurs in a list of monsters. In Jewish magical inscriptions on bowls and amulets from the 6th century CE onwards, Lilith is identified as a female demon and the first visual depictions appear.

In Jewish folklore, from the satirical book Alphabet of Ben Sira (ca 700–1000 CE) onwards, Lilith appears as Adam's first wife, who was created at the same time ( Rosh Hashanah) and from the same dirt as Adam – compare Genesis 1:27. (This contrasts with Eve, who was created from one of Adam's ribs: Genesis 2:22) The legend developed extensively during the Middle Ages, in the tradition of Aggadic midrashim, the Zohar, and Jewish mysticism. For example, in the 13th-century writings of Rabbi Isaac ben Jacob ha-Cohen, Lilith left Adam after she refused to become subservient to him and then would not return to the Garden of Eden after she had coupled with the archangel Samael. The resulting Lilith legend continues to serve as source material in modern Western culture, literature, occultism, fantasy, and horror.

Lilith is the name of a custom built workstation using the AMD 2901 bit-slice processor by the group of Niklaus Wirth at ETH Zürich. The project started in 1977 and by 1984 several hundred workstations were in use. It had a high resolution full page display, a mouse, a laser printer interface, and a network interface. Its software was written completely in Modula-2 and included a relational database program called Lidas.

Citing from Sven Erik Knudsen's contribution to "The Art of Simplicity": "Lilith's clock speed was around 7 MHz and enabled Lilith to execute between 1 and 2 million instructions (called M-code) per second. (...) Initially, the main memory was planned to have 65,536 16-bit words memory, but soon after its first version, it was enlarged to twice that capacity. For regular Modula-2 programs, however, only the initial 65,536 words were usable for storage of variables."

Lilith is a character in Jewish mythology.

Lilith, Lilit, Lilitu, or Lilis may also refer to:

• Lilith (Lurianic Kabbalah)

Lilith, in comics, may refer to:

• Lilith (Marvel Comics) is two comic book character in the Marvel comics
• Lilith (DC Comics) is a comic book superheroine in the DC Comics universe

Lilith is a 1964 film written and directed by Robert Rossen. It is based on a novel by J. R. Salamanca and stars Warren Beatty, Jean Seberg, Peter Fonda, Kim Hunter and Gene Hackman.

Lilith magazine is an independent, Jewish- American, feminist non-profit publication that has been issued quarterly since 1976. The magazine features award-winning investigative reports, first-person accounts both contemporary and historical, entertainment reviews, fiction and poetry, art and photography. Topics include everything from rabbinic sexual misconduct, to new rituals and celebrations, to deconstructing the JAP (Jewish American Princess) stereotype, to understanding the Jewish stake in abortion rights.

1. redirect Planetary objects proposed in religion, astrology, ufology and pseudoscience#Lilith

Lilith is a fantasy novel written by Scottish writer George MacDonald and first published in 1895. Its importance was recognized in its later revival in paperback by Ballantine Books as the fifth volume of the celebrated Ballantine Adult Fantasy series in September 1969.

Lilith is considered among the darkest of MacDonald's works, and among the most profound. It is a story concerning the nature of life, death, and salvation. In the story, MacDonald mentions a cosmic sleep that heals tortured souls, preceding the salvation of all. MacDonald was a Christian universalist, believing that all will eventually be saved. However, in this story, divine punishment is not taken lightly, and salvation is hard-won.

Lilith is the name of two fictional characters appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics.

The first of these two to appear was Lilith, the daughter of Dracula. Like her father, she is also a vampire, although her powers and weaknesses differ from most other vampires. She first appeared in Giant-Size Chillers featuring Curse of Dracula #1 (June, 1974) drawn by artist Gene Colan.

The second is a demon sorceress who is known as the "Mother of All Demons". She first appeared in Ghost Rider, Vol. 2, issue 28 (August, 1992).

Lilith is a pioneer American dark ambient music group formed by Scott Gibbons in 1986.

Early self-released albums contained little or no text to suggest authorship or titles, and were rooted in homemade audio devices and modified consumer electronics. By the early 1990s, Lilith's music had developed in a sombre minimalist direction, with growing research into extended compositions focused around very low frequencies. On signing with the Sub Rosa label, the name Lilith was taken after Earth's hypothetical moon to reflect that the music often suggested more than it revealed.

Most of their works use single sound sources for instrumentation; for example rocks on "Stone" (Sub Rosa: 1992). Unlike other artists working in similar directions, Lilith would perform in concert, and released two albums which were recorded live.

Lilith is a fictional character on The CW Television Network's drama and horror television series Supernatural. The series' writers conceptualized her as a dangerous new adversary for series protagonists Sam and Dean Winchester to face, introducing her to stabilize the story arc in the third season by giving demons a new leader in the wake of the death of the villainous Azazel and maintaining her as the primary antagonist until the conclusion of the fourth season. During the third season, Lilith tries to kill Sam and Dean, ordering for their deaths at the hands of her minions. Early in the fourth season it is revealed that her goal is to free her maker, the fallen angel Lucifer, from his imprisonment in Hell. The protagonists' attempts to thwart her plan is the main plot of that season.

As a "destroyer of children and seducer of men", the character initially possesses little girls but is later depicted as possessing young women in attempt by the writers to avoid showing violence towards children on-screen. The character received generally favorable reviews from critics, particularly for her role in " No Rest for the Wicked".

Lilith is an English-language opera created by American composer Deborah Drattell, with a libretto by David Steven Cohen. The opera reimagines Eve returning to Eden following the funeral of Adam. In the ruined paradise, she confronts Lilith, the notorious “other woman” who in legends such as the medieval Alphabet of Sirach mated with Adam before Eve was created.

Lilith was initially created as an orchestral piece for the Denver Symphony when Drattell was the organization’s artist in residence, but instead it was premièred with the New York Philharmonic in 1990. The piece was expanded to a full-length opera, with a world première planned in 1997 at New York’s Dicapo Opera, but the production was cancelled due to a labor dispute. Drattell reworked the piece, presenting it as a workshop offering at the Glimmerglass Opera in Cooperstown, New York in 1998. The full opera had its world première on November 11, 2001, at the New York City Opera with Lauren Flanigan as Eve.

In the teachings of Rabbi Isaac Luria, it is said that there are many Liliths. Manasseh Matlub Sithon said "many Liliths and demons are abroad, and go up and down."

The greatest of these is the wife of Adam Qadmon, a being that God used as an avatar to create the Universe in all its ten or more dimensions, hence a multiverse.

Another, more demonic Lilith, known as the woman of whoredom, is found in the Zohar book 1:5a. She is Samael ( Satan)'s feminine counterpart.

The Lilith that most are familiar with is the wife of Adam in the Alphabet of Ben Sira (8th to 10th centuries CE), known as Adam ha Rishon, "the common man," among kabbalists.

There are mixed views of Lilith in the Zohar. In one account she is Samael's counterpart and a mother of demons. In another she is seen seducing the fallen angels as Naamah; the angels Azza and Azazael after they challenge the Shekhinah (the feminine dwelling presence of God) over the creation of man. This is alluded in the Zohar book 1 :19a-b, 23a-b, 27a-b respectively. When Lilith and Naamah (another aspect of Lilith) were with Adam in his 130-year separation from Eve after the fall, they had daughters born from their union. These were the nashiym, the lilim, the liloth spirits who were the ones who seduced the Watchers. These daughters along with Lilith and Naamah are restored to Adam through the Wisdom of Solomon, the aspect of the Shekhinah, (referred to as the two prostitutes and the Nashiym in chapters 4 and 5 in the Zohar the Book of Concealment the Sifri D Tsri-nita).

Luria interpreted Book of Isaiah chapter 34:14-15 to mean Lilith would find her rest. From these passages rabbi Isaac Luria believed that Lilith was to be restored to Adam through the marriage of Leah to Jacob — Jacob was Adam, Leah was Lilith, and Rachel was Eve. It must be understood this one of many interpretations concerning the Zohar and of Lilith.