Your Email:

Friend's Email:

Note: (optional)

Subject:

Message: <br /><br /> If you are having trouble reading this email, you may view this article online at: http://www.jweekly.com/29687/full/29687/it-s-a-bird-it-s-a-plane-it-s-super-mensch/ <br /><br /> <b>It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s Super Mensch!</b> <br /> Friday, June 30, 2006 | by <br /><br /><p><b>(ynet)  | </b> “Superman Returns” is now in theaters, and alongside the flattering reviews, it has also sparked a debate about whether the superhero isn’t actually a super-Jew.<br /><br /> One of the eager participants in this debate is Rabbi Simcha Weinstein, writer of “Up, Up and Oy Vey,” which explores the concept of the Jewish superhero.<br /><br /> According to Rabbi Weinstein, also known as the Comic Book Rabbi, behind the Man of Steel’s cape hides a “bumbling, nebbish Jew.”<br /><br /> “Only a Jew would think of a name like Clark Kent,” he writes. “He’s a bumbling, nebbish Jewish stereotype. He’s Woody Allen. Can’t get the girl. Can’t get the job — at the same time, he has this tremendous heritage he can’t express.”<br /><br /> In an article on his Web site (<a href="http://www.rabbisimcha.com">http://www.rabbisimcha.com</a>), Weinstein explains that the superhero was invented due to rising anti-Semitism in 1930s America. When the German-American Bund, a pro-Nazi organization, marched through the hometown of young Jewish artists Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, they responded by inventing a hero in blue tights.<br /><br /> Arie Kaplan, a writer for Mad Magazine and the author of a series of articles dubbed “How the Jews Created the Comic Book Industry,” explains in his writings:<br /><br /> “Superman is a child survivor named Kal-El (in Hebrew, ‘All that is God’) from the planet Krypton, whose population, a race of brilliant scientists, is decimated. His parents send him to Earth in a tiny rocket ship, reminiscent of how baby Moses survived Pharaoh’s decree to kill all Jewish newborn sons.”</p> <p> </p>

Please enter the letters and numbers you see in the image below: