Editing Superman (section)

===Religious themes===
It is popularly believed that Superman took inspiration from Judaic mythology. The British rabbi [[Simcha Weinstein]] notes that Superman's story has some parallels to that of [[Moses]]. For example, Moses as a baby was sent away by his parents in a reed basket to escape death and was adopted by a foreign culture. Weinstein also posits that Superman's Kryptonian name, "Kal-El", resembles the [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]] phrase ''qōl ʾēl'' (קוֹל-אֵל) which can be taken to mean "voice of God".<ref name="UUaOV">{{cite book |last=Weinstein |first=Simcha |author-link=Simcha Weinstein |year=2006 |title=Up, Up, and Oy Vey! |edition=1st |publisher=Leviathan Press |isbn=978-1-881927-32-7 }}</ref> The historian [[Larry Tye]] suggests that this "Voice of God" is an allusion to Moses' role as a prophet.<ref name="Tye, 2012">{{cite book|author-link=Larry Tye|last=Tye|first=Larry|title=Superman: The High-Flying History of America's Most Enduring Hero|year=2012|publisher=[[Random House Digital]]|isbn=978-1-4000-6866-1|pages=[https://archive.org/details/supermanhighflyi00tyel_0/page/65 65–67]|quote=Like Moses. Much as the baby prophet was floated in a reed basket by a mother desperate to spare him from an Egyptian Pharaoh's death warrant, so Kal-El's doomed...|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/supermanhighflyi00tyel_0/page/65}}</ref> The suffix "[[El (god)|el]]", meaning "god", is also found in the name of angels (e.g. [[Gabriel]], [[Ariel (angel)|Ariel]]), who are airborne humanoid agents of good with superhuman powers. The Nazis also thought Superman was a Jew and in 1940 the ''[[Schutzstaffel]]'' (SS) newspaper [[Das Schwarze Korps]] denounced Superman and his creator Jerry Siegel.<ref>{{cite news|last= |first=|date=April 25, 1940 |title=Jerry Siegel Attacks! |page=8 |url=http://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/superman.htm |newspaper=Das schwarze Korps |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160112183828/http://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/superman.htm |archive-date=January 12, 2016 }}</ref>

All that said, historians such as Martin Lund and Les Daniels argue that the evidence for Judaic influence in Siegel and Shuster's stories is merely circumstantial. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were not practicing Jews and never acknowledged the influence of Judaism in any memoir or interview.<ref>{{harvp|Lund|2016}}</ref><ref>{{harvp|Daniels|1998}}. ''Superman'', p. 19: "There are parallel stories in many cultures, but what is significant is that Siegel, working in the generally patronized medium of the comics, had created a secular American messiah. Nothing of the kind was consciously on his mind, apparently: his explanation for dropping Superman down from the sky was that "it just happened that way". And Shuster echoed him: "We just thought it was a good idea.""</ref>

Superman stories have occasionally exhibited Christian themes as well. Screenwriter [[Tom Mankiewicz]] consciously made Superman an allegory for Jesus Christ in [[Superman (1978 film)|the 1978 movie]] starring [[Christopher Reeve]]: baby Kal-El's ship resembles the [[Star of Bethlehem]], and Jor-El gives his son a messianic mission to lead humanity into a brighter future.<ref name=SteelDreams>{{cite magazine |last=Dickholtz |first=Daniel |date=1998 |title=Steel Dreams |url=http://supermania78.com/2010/08/tom-mankiewicz-1942-2010/ |magazine=Starlog Yearbook |page=77 |publisher=Starlog Group, Inc.}}</ref>
This messianic theme was revisited in the 2013 movie [[Man of Steel (film)|''Man of Steel'']], wherein Jor-El asks Superman to redeem the Kryptonian race, which corrupted itself through eugenics, by guiding humanity down a wiser path.<ref>''Man of Steel'' (2013; Warner Bros. Pictures). "They won't necessarily make the same mistakes we did, not if you guide them, Kal."</ref>