ISAIAH 34:11-15 (LILITH AND AZAZEL)

The context of this passage is as part of a prophecy against Edom, describing how it will become a desolate wilderness in the future. And, in fact, it is one of a number of similar descriptions found within the prophetic writings showing the utter desolation brought about by Yahweh's judgment on sin. Other examples are found in Isaiah 13:21-22; 30:6; Jeremiah 50:39 As Eggleston expresses it, the idea is: “The wilderness represents, then, a general place of death and disorder.” This general concept is also found in New Testament texts such as Matthew 12:43-45 and Luke 8:29. (Heiser)

This portrayal of the desolate wilderness carries over onto its denizens so that “particularly sinister elements of the animal kingdom...were in league with the devil.” (Dictionary of Biblical Imagery) These beings could also be identified by characteristic habits such as night-sight, hissing, and their poisonous nature. As McKenzie says, “Animals and demons are interchanged in this passage.”

The creatures we encounter in turn are as follows, citing the KJV with alternative translations in parentheses: cormorant (desert owl, hawk, horned owl, pelican, vulture), bittern (screech owl, porcupine, bustard, hedgehog, skunk), owl (great owl, screech owl), raven (crow), dragon (jackal, wolf, wild dog), owl (desert owl, ostrich), wild beast of the desert (desert creature, marmot, wildcat), wild beast of the island (hyena, jackal), satyr (Azazel, demon, wild goat, he-goat, goat-demon, devil, night monster), screech owl (night hag, night owl, nightjar, Lilith, night-demon Lilith, demon, night-demon), great owl (owl, sand partridge, viper), and vulture (falcon, kite, buzzard, carrion birds).

You should not be overly concerned over the pronounced lack of agreement in these translations since some ambiguity is always present in the OT where the technical names of animals, plants, minerals, etc. are concerned.

Isaiah 34 does differ somewhat from similar OT prophecies in that the prophet “intensifies the descriptions of Isa 13,21f and Jer 50,39 by listing the inhabitants of the periphery in a detailed way and by introducing Lilith.” (Frey-Anthes) She (or it, or them) is one of two creatures in verse 14 on which I would like to concentrate since they are the only ones that may possibly represent demonic beings.

Lilith (lilit)

“This name...presents great difficulties of interpretation.” (Douglas) And it has a particularly long history of use in the Middle East. It first appears as the designation for a Sumerian night-demon who strangled children. Douglas explains, “Some scholars regard it as the equivalent of the English vampire...Later Jewish literature speaks variously of Lilith as the first wife of Adam, but she flew away and became a demon; as a fabulous monster which stole and destroyed newly born infants; and as a demon against which charms were used to keep it from the haunts of men, lest it enter and bring disease.”

By contrast, Blenkinsopp notes that in the Qumran documents and the Jewish Targum, lilith is given in the plural, thus leading to a more mundane translation of “nightjars” (as in NEB), a type of rather secretive bird. But he himself prefers to stick to the singular noun, as in the standard Hebrew text. Thus, he feels Isaiah 34:14 is to be read “as the installation of Lilith as queen of this spooky realm of death...”

Azazel (aza'zel)

Van Pelt and Kaiser introduce their discussion on this creature by saying, “Its undetermined origin and limited use in the Old Testament [mainly in the Leviticus 16 description of the so-called scapegoat ritual] has resulted in much speculation and uncertainty with regard to its precise and original meaning.” They outline four possibilities for understanding the term, also echoed by van Salms:

1. The Hebrew word may be a combination of 'z (“goat”) and 'zl (“to go away”) resulting in “escape-goat” (NIV, NASB). However, statements in Leviticus 16:10,26 “make it difficult to support this interpretive option.”

2. Based on a similar Arabic word, it may simply mean “entire removal.” However, Leviticus. 16:8 seems to refute this translation.

3. It may indicate the place where the goat goes, based on rabbinic tradition. But this causes a problem with Leviticus 16:8,10,22.

4. Azazel is a desert demon or other demonic personage, as when it is used in the much later Book of Enoch. Heiser adds that in I Enoch. Azazel actually becomes another name for Satan himself, leader of the angels in Genesis 6:1-4 who transgressed the boundary between heaven and earth to cohabit with women.

Van Pelt and Kaiser conclude: “In truth, no one position can be maintained with absolute certainty.” They feel that options 1 and 4 are supported by the best evidence; #1 is preferred for theological reasons, and #4 makes the best grammatical fit. One of the reasons for rejecting this last possibility is that it appears to say in Leviticus that an animal sacrifice is due to a demonic creature. But Heiser, Milgrom, and van Selms are united in stating that no such thing is implied in the ceremony. Instead, the goat for Azazel was carrying the sins of the people back to their underground source.

Conclusion

So is the Bible really proposing that demonic creatures inhabit deserted places on the earth? Several commentators attempt to answer that question:

Heiser: “Biblical writers were not expressing the notion that night birds and animals were actually demons any more than modern people who entertain superstitions about black cats think those animals are not members of the animal kingdom. An owl might be the symbol of Lilith, but owls were nevertheless birds. The vocabulary of nocturnal presence and behavior allowed the prophets to communicate the notion that some places are the jurisdiction of cosmic evil and therefore occupied by evil spirits.”

“Paradoxically both translations [of lilith as “night hag” or “owl”] may be correct, each reflecting different aspects of the same mythical embodiment in the creature we call the owl.” (DBI)

“It is likely that lilit was an actual desert animal, a bat or owl, who was animalistically endowed with demonic qualities by superstitious pagan worshipers.” (Van Pelt and Kaiser)

Similarly, both Oswalt and Douglas point to the great number of real animals in the rest of the Isaiah 34 list to make it more likely that only animals are being referred to throughout the text. As Douglas summarizes the situation, “there is...no real evidence for insisting on a mythological interpretation...”