The Genesis Plague (2010)

Time is cruel to them. You can see these discolorations in the black lettering.’ He indicated where complete passages had faded from crisp black to a greenish brown. ‘In the old days metals, like copper and lead, were mixed into the ink. Naturally, metals oxidize over time. If there hadn’t been men dedicated to preserving and transcribing these ancient works, they’d have been lost long, long ago. We’ve begun to digitize the collections … to permanently preserve them.’ He kept flipping pages. ‘Did you know that 7,000 monks once lived on this mountain?’

‘I did not,’ Hazo admitted. With the monk hunched over the book, Hazo now realized just how stooped the man’s shoulders were; partly from age, Hazo was sure, but partly from the decades-long repetition of this very act.

‘Yes, it is true. Seven thousand monks. And many of those men dedicated their lives to the task of preserving our history. Without them …’ He shook his head gravely while keeping his eyes buried in the pages. ‘Though some criticize the accuracy of transcriptions through the ages, there come times when source material - the very origin of a story - is discovered, and it vindicates the written legacy. What you found in that cave is a fantastic example. Ah, yes. See here,’ he said, stopping on a page and tapping the lollipop tip of the stylus on its central drawing. He straightened and took a step to the side. ‘Look familiar?’

Hazo stepped closer and leaned in to examine the drawing, which replicated images in his photos. ‘Oh my,’ he said. The detail was incredibly accurate. So accurate that he could only believe that the artist must have seen the cave itself. ‘It is the same.’

‘A perfect match, I would say.’

‘And the words?’ Judging by the characters that matched the inscriptions he’d seen in the church, they appeared to be Aramaic. ‘What do they say?’

Strangely, the monk didn’t need to read the text to answer Hazo.

‘The words speak of the beginning of recorded history. A time when God cleansed the earth with water to begin anew. When the first woman created by God had returned to paradise to seek retribution.’

‘This has to do with Eve?’ Hazo said, now completely perplexed.

The old man shook his head and smiled knowingly. ‘This is the mistake you made earlier. Not Eve.’ He whispered conspiratorially: ‘Lilith.’

23

‘Lilith?’ Hazo scrutinized the ancient drawing. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Eve was not the first woman created by God,’ the monsignor explained. ‘The Bible is full of contradictions. And the scriptures’ opening pages are no exception.’

From a nearby bookshelf, he retrieved a bible; opened the front cover and turned to the first page.

‘If one carefully reads Genesis 1 and Genesis 2, one will discover two separate accounts of God’s creation of humans. In Genesis 1, man and woman are created simultaneously. Listen.’ He traced the lines of the Bible with the stylus then read, ”’So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.”’ His eyes shifted up from the page. ‘Just like He created every living creature in duality to facilitate procreation, you see.’

‘Simultaneously,’ Hazo said in a low voice. How could it be? he thought.

‘That is right. Yet it is the second account told in Genesis 2 that most remember. When a lonely Adam wanders the garden paradise, and God, in afterthought, decides that man needs a spiritual companion.’

‘When God takes Adam’s rib to make Eve.’

The old man smiled. ‘Not literally a rib. A better translation would refer to “his side”,’ he corrected, before continuing: ‘Eve was Adam’s second partner, his consummated wife, who the Bible tells us was destined by God to be dominated by her husband. Lilith, the first woman created by God, was much the opposite. She had a voracious sexual appetite, always demanding to be, how shall we say … on top of Adam. She was anything but subservient.’

‘But it doesn’t say those things in the Bible, does it?’

The monk smiled. ‘That, too, is true. Any references to Lilith’s name were long ago removed from Genesis by the patriarchal Catholic Church, which didn’t like the idea of such a dominant female figure. However, if you wait here a moment, I can show you another picture that will help you understand this. You are like me, a visual learner, am I right?’

Hazo smiled. ‘I suppose I am.’

‘This is good, because pictures hold many truths, many secrets. I’ll just be a moment.’

The monk disappeared behind the stacks, and in under a minute he returned with a modern coffee table book titled Masterpieces of the Vatican Museums. He opened it and laid it flat on the table.

‘In 1509, Michelangelo painted Lilith’s picture on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel - the fresco called The Temptation of Adam and Eve.’

In the index, he found the correct page and flipped to it. Then he turned the book to Hazo so he could better see the photo.

‘Michelangelo based this narrative painting on an apocryphal text called The Treaty of the Left Emanation, which told that after God had banished Lilith from Eden, she’d vengefully returned in the form of a serpent to coax her replacement, Eve, into eating the forbidden fruit.’

Hazo studied the image that combined two scenes: the half-woman, half-serpent, entwined around the tree, reaching out to Adam and Eve, and beside it, the angel expelling the couple from the paradise.

‘This is the pivotal event in Christianity that speaks to Original Sin and the downfall of humankind. All attributed, of course, to the sin of a woman.’

‘Amazing,’ Hazo said.

‘There is one obscure reference to Lilith in the Old Testament as well. When Isaiah speaks of God’s vengeance on the land of Edom, warning them that the lush paradise will be rendered infertile and pestilence will bring desolation.’ Going back to the Bible, the monsignor turned to Isaiah 34. ‘Now listen to this: “The wild beasts of the desert shall also meet with the wild beasts of the island, and the satyr shall cry to his fellow; the screech owl also shall rest there, and find for herself a resting place. There shall the great owl make her nest, and lay, and hatch, and gather under her shadow.” A bit cryptic, yes. Unless one reads the original text from which it was transcribed.’ He then read from the page’s right-hand side: Hebrew text panelled alongside the English translation. ‘The literal words are: “yelpers meet howlers; hairy-ones cry to fellow. Lilith reposes, acquires resting place”.’

‘So she is specifically mentioned in the Bible,’ Hazo said.

‘Indeed. Lilith is also mentioned throughout Jewish apocrypha, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Talmud, the Kabbalah, the Book of Zohar, and the medieval Alphabet of Ben Sira. All portray her as a demonic seductress who tortured men and made them impotent; a jealous vixen who killed babies out of spite. As such, her earliest depictions - statues, amulets and figurines - morph her voluptuous beauty with beastly features, like wings and talons. But Lilith’s story goes back much, much further than this, you see.’

The monk explained that when the Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem in 586 BC, King Nebuchadnezzar II exiled the Jewish priests to Babylon. Having lost the Jerusalem temple and its sacred texts, the priests recreated a written account of their heritage and ancestry, borrowing heavily from the Mesopotamian mythology learned from the Babylonians. Many of those stories had been traced to the third millennium BC, to Akkadian cuneiform texts that spoke of the Lilitu - demons of the night; bearers of pestilence who wandered desolate places to wreak havoc on humankind. Centuries of oral tradition preceded even those writings.

‘The legend of Lilith may be the most ancient tale ever told,’ the monsignor said. ‘How old, no one really knows. But most would agree that Lilith is the progenitor of all female demons that later emerge in Mesopotamian, Greek and Roman mythology.’

The monk removed his glasses and his expression turned severe.

‘Perhaps now you know too much, my son. Because these photos of yours … these are very ancient images of the story of God’s creation of the first woman. The story of paradise lost. And though it may sound crazy, if not impossible, it appears to me that you’ve stumbled upon a most legendary place.’

‘Please, tell me,’ Hazo beseeched.

The monk pointed to the last photo image showing men busily preparing a headless body for burial. ‘Lilith’s tomb.’