Bitter Waters, the Sotah, and Lilith

Lilith as the First Prototypical Sotah

Of all the ancient Jewish myths, the legend of Lilith has perhaps influenced and shaped more modern mythologies and lores
than any other. Her legend was not only the springboard for the myths of succubi and night-hags, it also may have served as
the initial source for modern vampire lore. According to her Jewish legend, Lilith was the first wife of Adam. She was
created by God from the soil of the earth at the same time as Adam, but she later rebelled against him and fled the garden.
Her replacement was Eve, whom was created from Adam’s side. Lilith’s legend holds that Adam was created from dry dust,
but she was created from muck and mud. The legend continues that Lilith was not a suitable helpmeet for Adam. She
rejected Adam’s authority and refused to submit to him. The basis for her defiant stance was that she claimed that she was
fully Adam’s equal because she was created from dust at the same time as he. Lilith completed her rebellion against Adam
after one particularly insubordinate arguement by unleashing her long hair and uttering the holy name of Jehovah. She
thereby miraculously sprouted wings and fled the garden.

According to the Kablistic legends, Lilith later returned to the garden as the Serpent whom tempted Eve. Other extended
versions of the legend hold that after Lilith fled, Adam became lonely and sought to recover his errant woman. At Adam’s
behest Jehovah sent three angels to return her. They found her in the midst of the Red Sea at the future site of Israel’s
miraculous Red Sea crossing. But Lilith refused to return with the angels and chose rather to become the mother of
demons. She did this by mating with demons and / or stealing semen from men at night while they slept. Because of Lilith’s
refusal the angels cursed her that every day 100 of her demon children would die. Lilith in return resolved that she would
visit Eve’s children in childbirth and kill those whom she found were not protected by the names of the three angels. Lilith’s
legend strongly touts her role as a slayer of children. In the Middle Ages this role was further refined when Lilith was said to
be the mother of estries – female bird-like winged monsters whom were said to devour children and drink their blood.
Esteries are the earliest known incarnations of the modern vampire legend.

Most people acquainted with the Bible consider the Lilith legend as merely a colorful and interesting fictional myth with no
Biblical basis. This is certainly an understandable position, as the legend’s rendition of early events in the garden appears
completely incongruous with the plain written record of Genesis. Yet, if there is such scant evidence for Lilith, how could
the rabbis of the Talmud and the Kabalah, some of the most learned Jewish scholars over the last two thousand years, teach
her existence? On what basis did these most sage experts adopt ideas that appear in conflict with the plain Biblical record?
As we shall see, there is actually much evidence supporting most of the Lilith legend in Genesis. This evidence lies in the
literal Hebrew of the Genesis account and logical deductions that may be therefore derived. This evidence identifies Lilith
as the Serpent. It also explains numerous facets of her legend, such as why she is said to be created from mud and muck,
and not dust like Adam. This evidence not only supports the essential ideas of her myth, but the analysis by which this
evidence will be developed is propbably much the same means by which the rabbis and authors of the Kabalistic writings
originally concluded details of her legend. Based soley on Biblical evidence, this analysis makes a strong case for Lilith.
And the details of her history and nature surmised from the analysis is remarkably in sync which her most ancient legends,
both Jewish and non-Jewish.

The Lilith legend is ancient. The first written account of Lilith comes in the epic Gilgamesh and the Huluppu Tree (circa 2000
BCE). This account even predates Genesis (circa about 1450 BCE). In Gilgamesh Lilith and a snake haunt a great tree
situated in a holy garden of the gods. As we shall discuss later, this tale has strong parallels with the garden of Eden and
tree of knowledge of good and evil. Lilith’s next written record comes in Genesis, where we shall show she appears as the
Serpent in the garden of Eden. There are also other apparent Biblical references to Lilith in Isaiah 34 and Proverbs 30 (circa
700 BCE). Lilith also makes a few appearances in the Bible under the moniker of Leviathan, which Isa 27 identifies as the
fleeing serpent before God. Lilith also makes a handful of appearances in the the Talmud (circa 400 CE). One writer warns in
the Talmud that she comes in secret at night to men in their sleep, much like a succubus or night hag, to steal semen from
them. Another Talmudic writer holds that she stole semen from Adam in such a manner, and with this she inseminated her
first seed. The Kabalistic sages of the Middle Ages first recorded the full details of the Lilith legend. It is from their writings
that we get most of our legend details today. In the Zohar (circa 1200 CE) we get the first identification of Lilith as the
Serpent of the garden of Eden. She is described as innately animated and possessed by the spirit of Lucifer, and she is held
responsible for the fall of Eve. This part of Lilith’s legend struck a cord in later Christian circles. Michelangelo depicted
Lilith as the Serpent in his famous paintings on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, and she is likewise depicted as the tempting
Serpent in a carving on the Notre Dame cathedral in France. Lilith appears in many other artworks of the era as the Serpent.

I have found that a coherent collection of Biblical evidences supporting the case for Lilith has been heretofore non
existent. In fact, the only argument usually put forward - that Genesis speaks of two creation accounts of a man and woman -
is almost always presented in an outrageously flawed manner. The faulty argument generally follows the notion that none of
the events described in Ge 2 are a recap or retelling of events that happened in Ge 1. Thus the reasoning goes, when Ge 1:
26-29 speaks of the creation of a man and woman and Ge 2:18-22 then speaks of the creation of Eve, the two passages must
refer to different events. This simplistic argument is based on outrageously faulty logic. If all of Ge 2 was read as
documenting new events not specified in Ge 1, then Ge 2:7 would imply there are also two Adams! Furthermore, there would
be two whole planets, each with its own ocean, atmosphere, and array of life! We must recognize that parts of Genesis 2 do
recap Genesis 1.

Because of the paucity of coherent arguments in the public domain supporting Lilith's existence in Genesis, I have collected
into this one treatise all 14 Biblical evidences I have discovered that support her case. Not all facets of the Lilith legend are
supported by the collected evidences, but most are. Many of the remaining unsupported elements of the legend are easily
assumed extrapolations of events that must have taken place. .

Download the PDF document at the top the page for the complete argument in support of the case for Lilith.

Summary of
The Bitter Water Codes

This book studies the spiritual meaning of a lengthy encoded message found hidden in the Hebrew of Numbers 5:10-31. These
Biblical passages cover the mysterious bitter water trial for Israelite wives suspected of adultery. In that ancient rite,
husbands who suspected their wives of adultery, but whom had no witnesses or proof against their wife, brought their wives
to the Temple. There the priests used bitter waters to supernaturally test the women for adultery. The priest created the bitter
waters by casting dust from the Temple floor into holy water and then blotting into the waters a parchment upon which was
written a curse and Jehovah’s holy name. The priest then caused the suspected wife to drink. According to Numbers, if she
was guilty the waters entered into her for bitterness. Immediately her appearance sickened, her belly swelled, and her thigh
fell away. Conversely, if the woman was innocent, she was unharmed by the waters. Furthermore, the text promised that she
would bear a son.

The encoded message explains several key features of the trial. Why was dust strewn into holy waters? Why was the written
curse and Jehovah’s holy name blotted into the waters? Why were the two primary symptoms of the guilty woman a swelling
belly and a thigh which fell away? The message reveals that the trial’s rituals enacted a supernatural pregnancy. If the woman
was guilty, her resulting seed brought curses. However, if she was innocent, her seed atoned for her.

The encoded message is found using a novel cipher. Instead of the ELS (Equidistant Letter Sequence) code of many recent
works, this book uses the FLEWS (First Letter Every Word Sequence) cipher. The resulting codes consist of 124 contiguous
words formed from the entire 348 character stream corresponding to the first letters of every word in the relevant Numbers
text. The words form coherent sentences which comment upon the trial’s events. The book goes on to show how these 124
first generation words forms another base text upon which the FLEWS cipher may again operate. Doing so yields a 47 word G2
(second generation) encoded message. This process may be repeated again and again, yielding a 27 word G3, a 9 word G4,
and a 2 word G5 message. Each generational message is intimately related to its parent text and builds upon the overall
encoded message. The validity of this comprehensive message is assured because it is consistent with the Torah and several
key elements of the Talmud, the Midrash, and even the Kabbalah.

This book seeks more than just to prove the codes’ existence. It seeks to fully illuminate the message's mystical meaning. In
accomplishing this the book links key spiritual aspects of the trial to other Biblical mysteries – including the supernatural
animation of Israel’s golden calf, the ancient Jewish concept of golems, Adam’s creation from dust, and Lilith’s legend as the
first woman created directly from dust alongside Adam, but who was polluted by defiled waters and possessed by Satan to
become the infamous “Serpent” of Eden.