If we were able to trust all the rabbinic and kabbalistic sources available to us concerning Eve's alleged predecessor, Lilith, we would be forced to believe that she is a "fiery female spirit" who, although frigid, passionately seduces men in their sleep, and who, although sterile and childless, kills one hundred of her demon children daily. Dozens of conflicting Lilith traditions exist. If we are to discover and establish a meaningful image of Lilith, these different traditions must be disentangled strand by strand. While this entire task is not possible within the limited scope of this brief overview, we can begin it.

The first available version of the Creation story which associates the name Lilith with a "first Eve" is included in the Alphabet of Ben-Sira , a work probably written sometime in the Gaonic period (600-1000 C.E.). This account merges into two separate and distinct traditions-that of the Lilith of the Talmud and that of the "first Eve" of the midrash (legends).

Lilith in the Talmud: The personality called "Lilith" in the Talmud shows no connection with Adam at all. From the four specific references to Lilith in the Babylonian Talmud, we learn only that she is a wild-haired and winged creature with nymphomaniac tendencies (Erubin 100b, Niddah 24b, Shabbat 151b); and the mother of demons (Bava Batra 73a ).

Such a characterization of Lilith may have been drawn from the single Biblical mention of "lilith" (Isaiah 34:14):

The wild creatures of the desert shall meet with the jackals , the goat demon shall call to his fellow, the lilith shall also repose there and find for herself a place of rest.

"First Eve": The midrash (legends) of Genesis Rabbah discusses a "first Eve" but does not mention Lilith. According to Rabbi Hiya, she "returned to dust" (22:7). Judah, son of Rabbi Hiya, states that in the beginning God created Eve for Adam, but when Adam saw her being made with sinews and blood, he grew disgusted and became alienated from her. Thereupon God caused this first Eve to return to nothingness and proceeded to create a second Eve for Adam (18.4).

Two separate and distinct beings-Lilith of the Talmud and Eve 1 of the midrash-came together into one, to become Lilith, Adam's first mate. We can see this process of integration in the Alphabet itself. In the beginning of this account, Lilith is characterized as a woman (ishah). By the end of the story, however, her children are called demons (sheydim) and she herself has powers that can only be warded off by the mystical means of an amulet. Thus, having equated his protagonist with Lilith of the Talmud, the author was forced to assign her the characteristics attributed to her by that work.

Lilith in Kabbala: The various and often contradictory accounts found in subsequent kabbalistic literature of different periods seem to interweave the scant references of earlier Jewish sources with later myths culled from outside influences. Lilith's image depicted in medieval kabbalist literature is complex and evil.

Let us first examine the kabbalistic myths of Lilith's creation. The Alphabet account is the only version of the story in which Lilith is an independent being, for she was created out of materials similar to Adam's.

The Zohar (the central work of Jewish mysticism) develops a theory that Adam originally comprised both male and female elements. This is based on Talmudic and midrashic statements that "Adam, who was the first man, had two full faces" (Brachot 61a, Erubin 18b). Rabbi Samuel ben Nachman said: "When the Holy One, blessed be He, created the first man, he created him as a hermaphrodite." Rabbi Levi said the same thing:

When man was created, he was created with two body fronts, and He sawed him in two, so that two bodies resulted, one for the male and one for the female (Lev. Rab. 14:1).

The female was attached to the side of the male until God cast him into a deep slumber... God then sawed her off from him and adorned her like a bride and brought her to him, as it is written, "And He took one of his sides and closed up the place with flesh. " I have found it stated in an old book that the word "one" here means "one woman" to wit the original Lilith, who was with him and conceived from him. Up to that time, however, she was not a help to him, as it is written, "but for Adam there was not found a helpmeet for him." (134b).

Yalkut Re'uveni, a seventeenth- century collection, mostly of kabbalistic legends, no longer allows the first woman equal origins with Adam, as did the Alphabet of Ben Sira. A commentary on Gen. 2:21 states:

"In the beginning when the Holy One, blessed be He, created [the first] Eve, he did not create her out of flesh, but rather of the filth of the earth and the sediment." Adam, however, was only made from the earth.

Naamah "goes forth and makes sport with men and conceives from them through their lustful dreams."...[The offspring] all go to the ancient Lilith who brings them up. She goes out into the world and seeks her little ones and when she sees little children she cleaves to them in order to kill them and insinuate herself into their spirits (Zohar III, 76b).

Lilith the Child Slayer: The tradition of Lilith as a slayer of children is seen in the midrash in Numbers Rabbah: "...like Lilith, who, when she can find no strange children, slays her own" (16:25). This Lilith seems to resemble the Babylonian demon Labartu or Lamashtu, for the child-slayer image has no foundation in the Talmud and certainly no connection with the first Eve. Since scholars differ widely as to the dating of Numbers Rabbah, it is difficult to determine whether the author of the Alphabet based his portrayal of Lilith as the evil spirit who harms babies on this source, or whether both drew from a common antecedent. In any case, the unity of the motifs of promiscuity and child-slaying does not occur until the time of the Zohar (see Zohar 119b).

Lilith's character, then, is a maze of contradictions, interweaving a variety of legends and traditions. If we isolate all the strands of demonology, separating the various interpolations of Lilitu, the wind spirit; Labartu, the child-slayer; Lamashtu, the Greek Lamia; Lilith, the night -demon; we are left with the story of the first Eve, who may or may not have claim to the name Lilith in the first place.

Stripped of the overlay of medieval mysticism and demonology this Lilith emerges as an independent spirit. Had she succeeded in her battle with Adam for equal rights, Lilith might today represent that spark of original creativity in whose image women could retrace and recreate their history. Instead history plunged her into the depths of demonhood. Only in the twentieth century, which has no use for sheydim, may the Lilith, who has been obscured by the mists of demonology these thousands of years, be revealed today as the first woman on earth, equal to man and a free spirit.