Who Was Lilith? The Semen-Stealing First Wife Of Adam

Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society

History Hit

Society, Sex, Scandal, Education, History

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 28 January 2025

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Lilith's story goes back 4,000 years, and she's still making an impact today.

She takes on different forms, depending on where you're looking, but a popular one was that she was the first wife of Adam, long before Eve, and was expelled from the Garden of Eden to go and live as a promiscuous, baby-killing, semen-stealing demon. As you do.

In short, she's embodies a lot of male anxieties about sex and women.

What are her true origins? What's with all the semen-stealing? And what's her connection to mermaids?

Joining Kate today is historian Sarah Clegg, author of Woman's Lore: 4,000 Years of Sirens, Serpents and Succubi, to help us get to know this fascinating woman better.

This episode was edited by Tom Delargy and produced by Stuart Beckwith. The senior producer was Charlotte Long.

All music from Epidemic Sounds/All3 Media.

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Betwixt the Sheets: History of Sex, Scandal & Society is a History Hit podcast.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, I'm your host, Kate Lister.
0:02.4	If you would like betwixt the sheets, add free and get early access, sign up to History Hit.
0:08.7	With a History Hit subscription, you can also watch hundreds of original documentaries with top history presenters.
0:16.0	And enjoy a new release every single week.
0:19.8	Sign up now by visiting history hit.com forward slash subscribe.
0:24.7	Hello, my lovely bit Twixters.
0:26.9	It's me, Kate Lister, and you are listening to About Twixter Sheets.
0:31.8	But before we can continue on our little merry adventure together, I have to tell you.
0:37.8	This is an adult podcast book
0:39.2	and other adults about adulty things
0:40.8	and an adulty wake or a range of adult subjects
0:42.5	and you should be an adult too.
0:44.2	Oh my God, do I have to keep saying that?
0:47.8	I suppose I do it because more people are turning up
0:50.2	and they might be easily offended.
0:52.1	So if that's you, this is your chance to sod off now
0:54.3	and leave the rest of us to crack on with it. Right! On with the show.
1:05.5	Deep in the Garden of Eden, a spat is unfolding. It's somewhat killing the idyllic vibe that they've got going on,
1:13.5	but let's listen in a little bit more closely. Oh, okay, there's Adam waltzing around like
1:19.2	his God's gift, which actually, I suppose technically, technically he was. But there's also
1:25.3	Lily, his first wife, and also God's gift.
1:30.3	He was around long before. God plucked a rib from Adam and created Eve. Oh, ha ha.
	...

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