The Gospel According to the World’s Greatest Superhero

July 6, 2008 on 6:11 am | In 3 Stars | 1 Comment

The Gospel According to the World’s Greatest Superhero
By Stephen Skelton
(Harvest House, 2006)

The Judeo-Christian parallels to Superman have become less subtle over the past decade, taking an even bigger leap after the blatantly Christian allegories presented in Bryan Singer’s 2006 film, “Superman Returns.” The question remains, however: was Superman created as a New Testment figure (Christ), an Old Testament/Jewish figure (Moses or Samson), or a secular figure all together?

In this book, author Stephen Skelton walks us though the life and stories of Superman, and puts them side by side with biblical stories. A father sends his only son to earth, and that child grows up using his amazing power to save mankind. The boy dies defending his beliefs, and he rises from the grave again. Clearly, that could be either Jesus Christ, or Superman. No argument there — but was that the intention of his creators, or was that something added much later.

Some of the parallels in the book are very real (if not still unintended); such as pointing out Superman’s Kryptonian surname, El, is also found in biblical references to “Elohim” (God). The suffic is shared by all the angels, also. MichaEL, GabriEL, UriEL, etc. They’re all something “of God.” While that semms like case-closed evidence that his creators intended a biblical figure all along, first you need to hear their side of things. Originally, it was “Kal-L”, and some historians have said the name “Jor-El” is actually a truncated form of the name “JERry SiegEL” – one of Superman’s creators. This is a good example of how things started simple and even secular, and in time have adopted new meaning.

It’s unlikely that these two Jewish creators, Siegel and his art partner Joe Shuster, ever set out to create any type of religious figure, let alone a Christian one. It’s more likely (as we’ve seen above) that various aspects of their upbringing subconsiously bled through into their work, if at all, and as the character was passed from creator to creator over the decades, they’ve each added a little more to it. During which, over time, Superman has indeed become more and more biblical. Today he’s become an icon of Christianity, but it does seem unlikely that this was the intention of his Jewish creators 70 years ago.

The author does himself and his book a great disservice, however, by reaching too far to make his connections. One example of this: The author says of Superman’s earthly name “Clark Kent” that Clark actually means Cleric and Kent in Hebrew is Kana, which in Greek becomes Krista and then in English becomes Christ. Therefore, he suggests, the name “Clark Kent” actually means the “Cleric Christ”. I can’t dispute his math, because honestly I’m not a biblical scholar, but even if he is right (and I have no reason to assume he’s not), that’s still a long way to reach for a meaning to Clark’s name. Again, turning to the creators themselves, it’s reportedly said by Siegel himself that Clark Kent was simply named after actors Clark Gable and Kent Taylor. There doesn’t appear to be any greater meaning to it.

So this book does have some fun facts in it, and some eerie parallels, too, but more often than not the author is either reaching for things that aren’t there or drawing conclusions that are true today but weren’t necessarily intended by his creators. You learn pretty quickly, reading the book, how to tell them apart. If nothing else, you’ll close the book with a few more trivia bits to impress friends at parties.

I’d give this book three stars!

FUN FACTS: When Superman rose from the dead, it was discovered by Lois Lane, who entered his large tomb and found his body missing. This is allegorical to the Bible, when Mary Magdalane inspected the tomb of Christ and found it empty.

The Psychology of Superheroes

June 16, 2008 on 7:25 pm | In 3 Stars | No Comments

The Psychology of Superheroes
By Robin Rosenberg, Ph.D.
(Benbella Books, 2008)

Y’know, as a writer myself, I love to know what makes a character tick. What makes them who they are, and what makes them do what they do. It’s a fascinating subject and a great way to understand the character if you ever hope to write him or her. The Psychology of Superheroes, edited by Robin Rosenberg, Ph.D., book seemed like it would be a great find for me, and while I certainly enjoyed it, I often found it to be dull and clinical.

This book looks at the psychological motivations behind your favorite characters.

* The positive psychology of Peter Parker.
* Themes of race and discrimination in X-Men.
* Gender roles in Wonder Woman.
* Nature versus nurture in Superman’s upbringing.
* Is the Punisher a clinical psychopath or just anti-social?
* Anger management and the Hulk.

Every single topic could be fascinating and well-explored … if they had any real writers.

This book is an anthology, written not by creative writers but mostly by clinical professionals. Yes, Virigina, there is a difference. Just because a writer scripts a story about a doctor working in a busy urban emergency room, that doesn’t make him a doctor. Likewise, just because Dr. John Somebody has been published in the “North American Journal of Psychology” doesn’t mean they know a thing about writing a captivating story.

They certainly know a lot about the characters, I can’t deny that; but most of their essays read like a disertation for a professional journal. In fact, if you substituted any of the popular character mentioned in these essays for more generic, unknown names, the essays would be virtually unreadable to the average person. I think it’s only because it’s dealing with characters we know and love that we even bother to read them.

After all … we’re talking about an entertainment industry, and to suck all the fun out of them is counterproductive to their creation.

Still, if you can get past the technical jargon, it’s still a fun and interesting book to read. I especially recommend it to writers who hope to someday script these characters’ adventures, as a way to better understand the motivation behind their actions. I also recommend it to anyone with a combined interest in comics and psychology — for you people, this book is like someone put their chocolate into your peanut butter!

Overall, it’s a great subject matter, with some excellent topics, that just fell a little flat in the hands of some less than entertaining authors.

I’d give this book three stars.

FUN FACTS: In the Marvel Universe, the X-Men have often been used as allegories for racial prejudice; Dr. Charles Xavier representing Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Magneto representing his idealogical counterpart, Malcom X.