The Seductress of Qumran

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This article is based on Joseph M. Baumgarten, “On the Nature of the Seductress in 4Q184,” Revue de QuÆmran 15 (1991–1992), pp. 133–143, and appears here with his approval.

A seductive woman, whose heart is “a snare” and whose legs “work wickedness,” is portrayed in a well-preserved poem found among the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran. The popular title for the poem (quoted in full in the sidebar to this article) is simply “The Seductress”; scholars refer to the text as 4Q184 because it is the 184th fragment from Qumran’s cave 4.¹ Although the Qumran scroll fragment dates to the first century B.C.E., the poem itself is probably much older.

The unnamed protagonist of the poem is usually identified as a harlot, a common prostitute who leads men to sin. Because the Qumran community was an isolated sect in the Judean desert wilderness, where there was little fear of encountering an urban streetwalker, most scholars interpret the poem as an allegory. The false woman of the poem, they suggest, represents the false teachings of a rival sect. Others have proposed that she symbolizes the tantalizing evils of Rome or that she represents an individual antagonist whose identity we can no longer determine.

Some have compared the Qumran seductress to the allegorical “strange woman” of the Book of Proverbs 2:16 and 5:3. This treacherous woman, whose lips “drip honey” and whose mouth is “smoother than oil,” is a metaphor for sin.

There are striking similarities between the two women, both of whom are linked with the netherworld. In Proverbs 5:5, for example we read: “Her [The strange woman’s] feet go down to Death; her steps take hold of Sheol.” (Sheol is the place of the dead in ancient Semitic tradition.) And Proverbs 2:18–19 relates: “Her house sinks down to Death, and her course leads to the shades. All who go to her cannot return and find again the paths of life.” Compare this with the following lines from “The Seductress”: “Her gates are gates of death, and from the entrance of the house she sets out towards Sheol. None of those who enter there will ever return, and all who possess her will descend to the Pit.”

Despite these correspondences, there is a significant difference between the woman of Proverbs and the Qumran seductress. The passage in Proverbs is a teacher’s warning to his pupil about the dangers of sexual promiscuity. The strange woman is a real-life figure 022who may be observed on any city street. The image of the netherworld is used simply to conjure up the dangers of sin.

The Qumran seductress, however, is not just compared with the netherworld: She belongs to it. There are strong reasons for identifying her with the notorious Lilith, the most durable demoness of the ancient and medieval world.

The Qumran poem, unlike Proverbs, is devoted entirely to a detailed description of the malevolent female demon and her baleful influence. Lines 1–7 portray the seductress. (The line numbers marked in the poem at left refer to the original Hebrew text, not the verses of the English translation.) The poem describes, in turn, her seductive speech, the corrupt nature of her heart and kidneys; the evil performed with her hands, legs and wings; her clothing; her ornaments; her bed; and, finally, her abode. Lines 8–10 relate the effect she has on her victims; lines 11–17 describe her stealthy movements in the streets.

Scattered throughout the poem are 11 allusions to the netherworld, described as Sheol, the Pit (Shachat, Bor, and Shuach), death (mot), silence (domah) and everlasting fire (mokday olam). The seductress leads her victims to the netherworld, for she is a denizen of this region. This is apparent from her physical description. Most significantly, she has wings—“a multitude of sins is in her wings” (line 4).²

In Near Eastern mythology, bird-like wings are conventional among residents of the underworld. Thus, in the Akkadian myth The Descent of Ishtar to the Nether World, we read of the winged demons who live with Irkalla, queen of the underworld:

To the dark house, the abode of Irkalla

To the house which none leave who have entered it,

To the road from which there is no way back,

To the house wherein the entrants are bereft

of light,

Where dust is their fare and clay their food,

Where they see no light residing in darkness,

Where they are clothed like birds, with wings for

garments.³

A striking visual representation of a winged netherworld deity appears on the Burney Relief (see photo of Burney Relief). Earlier this century, Henri Frankfort and Emil G.H. Kraeling identified the figure as Lilith.⁴ In the Talmud, Lilith is described as having wings, as Janet Howe Gaines notes in the previous article in this issue.⁵

In addition to wings, the woman of the poem has to‘afot—a term for “horns” that is used in the Bible as a metaphor for “strength” and “majesty.” In the Book of Numbers, for example, we read that “God who freed them from Egypt is for them like the horns (to‘afot) of the wild ox” (Numbers 23:22, 24:8). In the Wisdom of Ben Sira (called Ecclesiasticus by Roman Catholics who consider this book canonical), the same term is 023used to refer to an article of attire worn by the high priest—probably the mitre worn on his head.

Demonic figures with horns are known both from the Talmud and from an apocryphal psalm (11QPsAp^a) found among the Dead Sea Scrolls. The psalm describes the bastard offspring of men and angels as having horns. Furthermore, horned crowns are known from art: The Burney Relief provides one example. In addition, the Assyrian demon Pazuzu is depicted in sculpture with a horned crown. The reference to to‘afot in “The Seductress” may well refer to this style of horned crown.⁶

The Qumran seductress is prominently associated with darkness. The poem uses several terms to describe this quality (ishonei leilah, mosedei khoshekh, mishkavei khoshekh and mosedei aphelot), all of which are variations of “darkness.” Darkness is the principal feature of the Babylonian netherworld from which Lilith came. Indeed, the Babylonian underworld is called the dark house or house of darkness (bit ikliti). Furthermore, the description of the seductress’s realm as a house from which none will return (line 11) is a stock description of the netherworld in Babylonian mythology, as we saw in “The Descent of Ishtar,” quoted above.

The seductress, we are told, “despoil[s] (shadadah) all who hold her” (line 8). The verb shadad comes from the same root as the word for demon, shed. Here the author of the poem is probably deliberately alluding to Psalm 91:6, in which the demon Qeteb (literally, “the Scourge”) despoils men.

The last lines of the Qumran poem describe the seductress’s behavior in the streets. Ostensibly, her actions have much in common with those of a typical harlot. “In the city’s squares she veils herself, and she stands at the gates of towns.” However, the Qumran seductress is also characterized by a furtive effort to conceal herself and to lie “in ambush in secret places” (line 11). “Her eyes glance hither and thither” (line 13). Now, such furtive behavior might be common among prostitutes’ clientele, but it is unusual for the prostitute herself, who must be seen to attract business. The Qumran seductress’s persistent efforts to trap men has more in common with the Babylonian sorceress known as the kasûsûaptu, who, according to an ancient description of Babylonian ritual, “walks about in the roads, enters the houses, runs about the streets, chases through the squares: forward and backward she turns, remains standing on the road and turns her foot, in the square she blocks the way, the handsome man she robbed of his power, from the beautiful maiden she took the fruit.” Furthermore, the Qumran seductress sets up business in the gates of the town (line 12) while the kasûsûaptu, sits “in the shade of brick walls.”⁷

Whom does the Qumran seductress stalk? The righteous. “She lifts her eyelids naughtily…at upright men to pervert their way, and the righteous elect to keep them from the commandments” (lines 13–15). In this, she may be compared with another malevolent figure prominent in the Qumran writings: the satanic Angel of Darkness. According to the sectarian document known as the Community Rule, “The Angel of Darkness leads all the children of righteousness astray, and until his end, all their sin, iniquities, wickedness, and all their unlawful deeds are caused by his dominion in accordance with the mysteries of God” (1QS 3.22–23).

The association between the malevolent female spirit and the harlot has been remarkably durable throughout history, appearing again in the Zohar, a late medieval Jewish mystical text. The Zohar describes a woman who

adorns herself with many ornaments like a repulsive harlot, and takes up her position at the head of the highways and paths to seduce the sons of man…After she sees him turning aside after her from the path of righteousness, she divests herself of all the trappings which she put on for that fool…and she stands before him clothed in garments of flaming fire inspiring fearful terror.

(Zohar 1.148a)

Can you guess who is the subject of this passage from the Zohar? Lilith, of course. And who is the Qumran seductress? An earlier incarnation of this enduring figure: the malevolent, winged demoness who flies about in the dead of night, luring men into her house of darkness.

Scholars have long known about the Qumran sect’s interest in angels and angelology. Until recently, however, we were unfamiliar with the demons that terrorized their minds. We knew some names—Belial, Resheph, Lilith. Now we know just what they feared in at least one of these characters. For the author of 4Q184, the seductress, or Lilith, was not just an allegory. She was the very real and dangerous embodiment of the sinister powers that ruled the realm of darkness. From her abode in the darkness she would issue forth stealthily to lure the unsuspecting to apostasy and perdition.

A final note: The Qumran seductress may be contrasted with another biblical woman: the female personification of Wisdom. Psalm 151 (which appears in the Septuagint and was found in the Qumran library but does not appear in the received Hebrew text) employs markedly erotic language to portray the love for Lady Wisdom. Perhaps Lilith was the dark, other side of Lady Wisdom. Wisdom, according to Proverbs 7–8, also walked about the streets and cried out invitations from the city gates and streets (Proverbs 7–8). Lilith’s behavior would have made it difficult at times to tell these two women apart.