Superman & Lex Luthor: Ego, Archetype and Purpose

Part II: Superman (Click here for Part 1: Intro)

So what is the medicine of the savior archetype? How can this character move from a abstract source of generalized hope to a practically relevant and motivating force?

Let’s start by looking at the archetype of the Hero, the general type of archetype of which the Savior is a particular form. The Hero, as demonstrated in the classic “Hero’s Journey” stories, is often times characterized by the will to persevere. Whether it be Odysseus, Harry Potter, Luke Skywalker or Mulan, the hero meets inevitable challenge and follows through instead of running away in service of their goal.

The Savior is a type of Hero whose goals are in service of the collective good, rather than personal gain. Because of this self-less orientation, they are often held as embodiments of spiritual ideals and Divine values.

We can say there are three parts of this Savior archetype: the embodiment of transpersonal values, which extend into the will to persevere in noble action towards that aim, despite obstacles & the promise of hope for the future.

This Savior archetype is exemplified in the way that Superman’s unconditional compassion extends into the powerful actions he takes towards those aims. Superman as a savior has his will deeply rooted in service to the collective. This compassion is best displayed in the most recent Superman (2025), where he goes out of his way to save a single squirrel, let alone children and innocent bystanders from the line of fire. We even see his unconditional compassion on display in relation to the monster terrorizing the city, attempting to humanely transport the creature out of harms way rather than blowing it up the way his other superhero peers are quick to do without hesitation. His compassion is the fundamental premise from which he orients towards the world, from which his desire to act emerges.

Superman embodies this throughline of empowered values to empowered will to empowered action. If we consider these aspects as progressive extensions of eachother, rather than separate qualities-values lead to mindsets which lead to actions– we can see that there is a direct line of power that starts from his values and that extends through to the completion of action, without diminishment. In physics, this is analogous to a current of electricity passing through a conductor with zero resistance, and thus zero change in force throughout. (Actually, most common conductors are made of metals which result in some degree of energy loss through the current due to resistance, but there are some more rare materials which result in no energy loss, which allow for energy to be transmitted over large distances without any energy loss. Guess what these types of materials are called? Superconductors.) In spiritual terms, this is the meaning of “being aligned”, and has correspondence throughout various religions and spiritual traditions like the Zoroastrian tenets “Right thought, right word, right deed”, and the Buddhist 8 fold path “Right View, Right Intention, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, Right Concentration”.

(Alex Grey, Lightworker)

It is as if Superman has a unity of his being, like the Superconductor without resistance, that allows for the transpersonal magnitude for his internal sense of goodness to proportionally translate into the power with which he follows through in his action (towards that aim), without a loss of magnitude. 

Here we can introduce another popular symbol of the savior archetype to get a better sense of what this archetype represents; Jesus Christ. Like the Christ symbol, Superman is the embodiment of Divine ideals incarnate into Earthly form – part otherworldly and part human. But again, this bridge between the divine and the human is -archetypally- the bringing together of the deepest spiritual values (can we call it, simply, “Love”?) with the ability to carry them out into action into the realm of form. Symbolic images associated with saviors often allude to this premise… consider the intersecting vertical (spiritual) and horizontal (physical) planes of the Christ symbol.

(Alex Ross, Superman; Peace on Earth)

What does this look like in our human lives? Does living out our values to the fullest capacity save the world the way Superman does?