Lilith square or conjunct North Node: Integrating the Inner Animal
Image source: Wildlife Conservation Society
Disclaimer: The most commonly known myth of Lilith is a Jewish myth. In recent years there has been much discussion about how Judaism is a closed practice (or a semi-closed practice) and many people have rightfully brought up that for this reason it’s not appropriate for people who are not Jewish to interact with Lilith. I want to note here that though I am ethnically part Jewish, I am not of the Jewish faith. I’m an astrologer and I look at Lilith through the symbolic language of astrology, incorporating many potential branches of the archetype we now call “Lilith”, a good portion of which I’ve learned from Brennan Kettelle. I don’t worship Lilith or work with her in a spiritual sense, and it’s best to listen to Jews on this subject!
For several decades now, many people, and in particular women, have found Lilith to be a symbol of empowerment and of choosing oneself. In the Jewish myth, Adam and Lilith were made from the same material and because they were the equals, Lilith wanted to be on top during sex. Adam refused, and Lilith left the Garden of Eden to wander the earth in rage, fucking demons and birthing demon children. This is not the only Hebrew take on Lilith, just the most well-known. Additionally, the origin of ‘Lilith’ can be traced back to the Babylonian & Assyrian lilitu, and the Mesopotamian Lamashtu. Even the story of the Greek Lamia and Stryx bear similarities as well. Lilith is a complex figure with many possible roots and many limbs continually branching off from her many myths.
Throughout the myths in various cultures across time, Lilith has been associated with things like: wind, night, breath, ferality, infections, air, birds of prey (especially owls), sexuality, outcasts (and the act of being cast out), vampiric actions, succubi, menstruation, childbirth, miscarriage, rage, mud, equality, spite, sluttiness, the femme fatale archetype, serpents, and more.
Burney Relief, AKA Queen of the Night relief, 1800-1750 BC
Lunar nodes square Lilith & Lilith conjunct north node
For an in-depth explanation of the north and south nodes and the four basic steps to balancing them, check out this article titled The North Node and South Node in Astrology: The Secret Key to Life and/or book a Honeycomb reading with me.
People with Black Moon Lilith or asteroid Lilith square or conjunct their north node are learning to integrate their inner Lilith. Topics like rage, nonconformity, sexuality, and the primal, earthly part of the human animal are all important. Lilith is not high and mighty, nor bright and positive. She is murky and sharp and feral. She reminds us that we are not just upstanding human beings but also human animals. There are parts of us that remain untamed, no matter how long we have kept them a cage. This part of us is feral, and can be vicious. And for people with the north node conjunct or square Lilith, that also means that we must make peace with being disliked by some. She is an untamed force of destruction; in the case of Black Moon Lilith, she is (sort of literally) the dark side of the moon. Lilith is the part of our animal nature that is a courageous rebel at best and a murderous wave of rage at worst.
Integrating Lilith means accepting the dirty, animalistic parts of ourselves and of life — the parts that are smeared with mud and piss; ugly faces made in pleasure and rage; deformed bodies; snakes eating their prey alive. We don’t always have a toilet to shit in, utensils to eat with, or beds to sleep in. Lilithian people will eat with their hands, shit in the forest, and build a cave to sleep in. Banished to the dark side of the moon, reveling in shadows and screaming at the fates with the screech owls, Lilith lives where things aren’t pretty, but they are real. The ‘animal’ quality of Lilith (some of the figures related to Lilith have even often been depicted as being physically part animal) extends to embracing the physical body too (this part is especially true of Black Moon Lilith).
People born with Lilith conjunct or square the north node must learn how to access their anger (which is sometimes quite a task in itself!), and then how to channel it in healthy ways. Anger can feel like a tsunami to Lilith in water signs, a tornado to Lilith in air signs, a forest fire to Lilith in fire signs, and an earthquake to Lilith in earth signs — a powerful but ugly force of nature; the dark side of mother nature spitting back in our faces. There is a line we all cross when the rage we feel boils over, and it’s when we cross that line that our natal Lilith comes out of her cage. With the north node square or conjunct Lilith, tracing that line becomes important. We have to first learn the curves of that line, and then familiarize ourselves with the visceral feeling of the right time to let it boil over and when we’d better not. Working with Lilith in this way conjures the essence of the Strength tarot card (Lamashtu was even depicted as part lion) — it’s not necessarily about ‘taming’ our inner lion, but trying to work with it.
Embracing our inner Lilith comes with risk. The fears that we carry around our natal Lilith — that we will be cast out, hated, demonized, shamed if we let these parts of ourselves out — aren’t imaginary. They are things that may actually happen. In most cases, our Lilith ‘wound’ came from seeing someone we could identify with hated, cast out, shamed or outright abused as a result of embodying qualities associated with our Lilith placement. With Lilith square the nodes or Lilith conjunct the north node, we are recognizing or even owning those parts of ourselves anyway.
In many ways, Lilith can represent the part of ourselves that the world has told us is Bad, directly or indirectly, through hatred, bullying, systemic oppression, and the like. Maybe that part of you really is Bad, or maybe we live in a world where some people are given an unearned stamp of approval while that approval is denied to others without good cause. Lilith is a part of us that deviates from the norm, and while leaning into our natal Lilith placement, we must be ready for the reality that the world may not love this part of us. Part of getting to know Lilith is finding power in being the outcast, of standing apart, and of doing right by oneself and by anyone who is oppressed.