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I am named after one who's myth has survived over 5,000 years. Some say I am like her. I am certainly proud to be named after her.
(Image may be subject to copyright. Read the note at the end of this page.).
In the Qabala is said that Lilith was the first woman, Adam's first wife; she preceded Eve. In one of the stories she asserts her equality with Adam and refuses to be subordinate to him. For this she becomes banished and dropped from the canon, from the accepted body of scripture.
Picture this if you will. When Shaitan, the Adversary, asserted equality with God he was cast down and reviled and named the author of all that was bad in the world. Similarly, when Lilith asserts her equality, she, too, is cast down and reviled. Is it any wonder, then, that she is seen as a demon, a source of evil, a wife of Satan, as one who sucks the life out of children!? In truth, my namesake came long before those Sumerian myths and slanders. She was a powerful female leader in a time when women and men were equals, when women often ruled. She was there leading her people at the dawn of agriculture, a leader spreading a new technology and way of life. She must have been an extraordinary woman as we still remember her after over 10,000 years! And how extraordinary that 5,000 yr's later patriarchal societies were so afraid of her and her Goddess that they demonized her!
Who am I!? Well I would like to think I am more like that proud queen, that the image above is not of me. However, I am afraid to say I have more than a little of the demon Lilith in me. The wings and claws are mine. Beware!
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