A Writer's Notebook, Day One-Thousand-Five-Hundred-And-Forty-Nine

As I continue to research the connections between vampires and anti-Semitism, I keep running across these connections that feel very real, but which I recognize might not be intended.  As an example, I have recently been looking into Lilith who certain tales speak of as Adam's first wife.  She is a character from Jewish folk tradition and not written about in the bible.  To be clear, there is a reference to demons called the "lilim," and it is certainly true that this is connected to Lilith, but the bible does not speak of the specific character we call Lilith, only of a general category of demonic being.  Lilith, the character, is a specific invention of later storytellers building upon that biblical tradition.  Lilith exists exclusively as a part of that tradition, so I find it rather telling that many vampire tales name Lilith as the mother of all vampires. 

The use of an exclusively Jewish myth as the source for vampirism seems quite extreme, but as I have been researching, I also realized something that I find a bit more disturbing, especially as it aligns with some very upsetting anti-Semitic tropes.  To understand what I am getting at, one must realize that the majority of blood libel accusations involved blaming Jews for the murder of a child.  In looking at information on the myths surrounding Lilith, I came to find that she is specifically held responsible for still-births and other neo-natal fatalities.  I do not doubt that many of the writers that have referenced Lilith as the vampire progenitor know this aspect of her story, let alone believe that they have recognized the way that this  can be seen as connecting with aspects of the blood libel canard, but I also cannot ignore these kinds of connections.