ColossiansOne

Side by side, from the sources

Asmoday vs Aeshma

One of these is descended from the other: the later figure inherits the earlier one's name, and usually very little else. Aeshma-daeva to Ashmedai to Asmodeus — the strongest name-level link between the two traditions.

Demonic · Goetic Spirit · c. 700 BCE

Asmoday

also called Asmodeus, Asmodai, Sydonay, Ἀσμοδαῖος, אשמדאי

Commands seventy-two legions, one for every spirit in the book. He is the Asmodeus of Tobit, who killed Sarah's seven husbands and was driven into Upper Egypt by Raphael, and behind that the Avestan Aeshma-daeva, the demon of wrath — one of very few Goetic spirits with an ancestry that can be traced.

Alignment
Infernal
Rank
King
First attested
The Avesta · c. 1000-400 BCE
Named there as
Aeshma
Texts naming it
8
Powers attributed
8

Deity · Persian · c. 1000 BCE

Aeshma

also called Aeshma Daeva, Eshm, Khashm, Aēšma

The demon of wrath and of the bloody club. He also supplies the most defensible etymology for Asmodeus: *Aeshma-daeva* to *Ashmedai* to *Asmodeus*.

Alignment
Infernal
Rank
Daeva of Wrath
First attested
The Avesta · c. 1000-400 BCE
Named there as
Aeshma
Texts naming it
2
Powers attributed
3
48attestedZoroastrian

Where do they actually overlap?

Texts naming both

Powers credited to both

No shared office is recorded. Where two figures are said to be the same and share no job description at all, the identification is usually doing polemical work rather than descriptive work.

Common questions

Are Asmoday and Aeshma the same figure?

One of these is descended from the other: the later figure inherits the earlier one's name, and usually very little else. Aeshma-daeva to Ashmedai to Asmodeus — the strongest name-level link between the two traditions. ColossiansOne records the link rather than asserting the identity: where texts disagree about whether two names denote one figure, the disagreement is what gets shown.

Which is older, Asmoday or Aeshma?

Aeshma is the older name: first attested around c. 1000 BCE, against c. 700 BCE for Asmoday. Where the two dates are far apart, that gap is the whole reason the pair is worth comparing.

Do any texts name both Asmoday and Aeshma?

Yes — 1 text names both. A single text naming both figures is the strongest evidence available here that its author treated them as distinct, whatever later writers did with the pair.