Faust is the scholar or magician at the center of a European legend about bargaining with the Devil. The 1587 Faust book, Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus, and Goethe’s Faust give the story different treatments of knowledge, desire, damnation, and human striving.
Lilith is a figure whose history spans ancient Near Eastern demonology, Jewish folklore, medieval protective magic, Kabbalah, literature, feminist reinterpretation, modern occultism, and contemporary Satanic or Luciferian religion. She is often introduced today as “Adam’s first wife,” but that familiar story is medieval rather than biblical. Earlier sources describe beings called lilith or lilin in…