Tag Archives: superman

Martin Lund Reconstructs Superman’s Judaism

Superman puzzleThis Fall, Palgrave Pivot is releasing Re-Constructing the Man of Steel: Superman 1938–1941, Jewish American History, and the Invention of the Jewish–Comics Connection by S&S’s own Martin Lund. The super-sized title only hints at the herculean task Lund has taken on: To objectively explore the Judaic origins to the Last Son of Krypton’s publications, too often a site of distortion an mythicism. Rather than discard Superman’s Jewishness wholly, Lund “offers a new understanding of the Superman created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster in the mid-1930s, presenting him as an authentically Jewish American character in his own time, for good and ill.”

The book is due out this October and is available now for preorder. It is the second title in Palgrave Pivot’s “Contemporary Religion and Popular Culture” series.

Who Gods the God/Men?, Part II (Or, Prepare Ye the Way of the Rao)

WARNING: This is a spoiler concerning JLA: Justice League of America #2, just out this past July from DC Comics.

jla2aSo, immediately on the heels of JLA: Justice League of America #1‘s last-page surprise that Superman’s Kryptonian god Rao has come to Earth, issue #2 provides a full look at the supposed divinity and offers his directives.

“Prepare the way for me, Kal-El. Tell the people of your world who I am.”

Rao sounds much like the voice of the Abrahamic God as chronicled in such places as Mark 1:2-3: “As it is written in Isaiah the prophet: ‘Behold , I send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; the voice of one crying in the wilderness, “Make ready the way of the Lord, make His paths straight.”‘”

In that case, then, Superman/Kal-El is Rao’s John the Baptist (or, depending on your reading of the scripture, perhaps Isaiah). At the same time, if Rao is going to speak through Superman with his “way,” then Kal-El could have a (thoroughly un-Islamic) Mohammed-like role.

It could also make Kal-El Moses, depending on one’s translation of Exodus 3:13-14, namely: “Then Moses said to God, ‘Behold, I am going to the sons of Israel, and I will say to them, “The God of your fathers has sent me to you.” Now they may say to me, “What is His name?” What shall I say to them?’ God said to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM’; and He said, ‘Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, “I AM has sent me to you.”‘” And a number of writers would be thrilled to have Superman represent Moses instead of Jesus

Continue reading Who Gods the God/Men?, Part II (Or, Prepare Ye the Way of the Rao)

Sequart’s The Last Temptation of Superman

Over at Sequart, Ian Dawe threads an intriguing connection between Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon’s milestone Superman story “For the Man Who Has Everything” and Nikos Kazantzakis’s The Last Temptation of Christ. Though Superman is frequently posited as a Christ figure, Dawe raises a number of thoughtful points on “Christian overtones” that likely hadn’t previously been applied to this work by the Watchmen team. Read more here.