Do Jews Really Believe That Lilith Is A Notorious Demon?

Question:

Do Jews Really Believe That Lileth Is A Notorious Demon ?

Jacob’s Answer:

Thank you for your question.

Lilith is listed as an animal Isaiah 34 and as a female monster in the Dead Sea scrolls “Songs of the Sage”.

The Babylonian Talmud identifies Lilith with Akkadian and Babylonian female demons.

Mystical Jews in the Middle Age identified Lillith as a female demon who was a wife of Adam older than Eve who was not made from Adam’s rib, probably based on Jewish reinterpretations of Babylonian gnostic and mystical traditions. There may be references to Lilith in the Epic of Gilgemesh, etc. but this is disputed by scholars.

Chassidic Jews who are kabbalists may believe in Lilith as a she devil. Scripturally however demons are mere fallen angels and are sexless spiritual bodies, but angels appear In human form as men not as women.

Most Jews who have even heard of Lilith (many and in fact probably most have not) ‚  regard it as a medieval myth adopted from an older superstition of ancient Babylonian Jewish ‚  origin ostensibly drawn from the text Isaiah. Except by kabbalists, Lilith is usually seen as a mythologized reinterpretation of a creature from Isaiah 34 or simply as a myth akin to the Golum of Prague (the Jewish equivalent of Frankenstein’s monster in Kaballah). The only Jews who believe in Lilith today are kabbalistic mystics and gnostics. Most find it a joke.

I trust this helps.