Created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, Jor-El first appeared in the Superman newspaper comic strip in 1939.

Jor-El is able to save his infant son Kal-El (Superman) by launching him towards Earth in a homemade spaceship just moments before Krypton explodes.

When Superman later constructs his headquarters, the Fortress of Solitude, he honors his biological parents with the inclusion of a statue of Jor-El and Lara holding up a globe of Krypton.

[4][5] As DC developed this concept through further stories, the version of Superman's father during the previous Golden Age of Comic Books was identified as "Jor-L", matching the original spelling of the character's name, who lived on the Krypton of the Earth-Two "universe" (derived from the versions of characters and stories that appeared during the earlier "Golden Age" period of publication history).

He soon discovers, to his horror, that Krypton's core is extremely unstable and radioactive, and will eventually reach critical mass and explode, taking the entire planet and its populace with it.

[8] Jor-El tries to convince the members of the Science Council of this impending disaster and urges re-establishing Krypton's space program so giant spacecraft can be built to carry the populace to another habitable world.

As Krypton goes through its final destructive stages, Jor-El and Lara place their son in the rocket and launch him toward Earth, before they are killed along with almost all the rest of the planet's population.

Indeed, Jor-El himself is considered a "throwback" for actually expressing emotions toward his mate Lara and favoring the less sterilized days of past Kryptonian eras.

Another change in this version is Jor-El genetically altering his son's fetus (gestating in a "birthing matrix") to allow him to leave Krypton (in this version of the mythos, Kryptonians are genetically "bonded" to the planet itself, not allowing them to leave) and merely attaching a warp engine to the matrix instead of constructing a ship wholesale.

However, a more recent storyline co-written by Geoff Johns and Superman director Richard Donner presented yet another version of Jor-El and Krypton which reintroduced General Zod and the Phantom Zone criminals.

With art by Adam Kubert, Jor-El is depicted for the first time with a beard and the design of Kryptonian society is distinct yet again from Birthright and Man of Steel, incorporating elements of Donner's work on the first two Christopher Reeve films, in particular the notion of Krypton's Council threatening Jor-El with harsh penalty of exile to the very Phantom Zone he himself discovered if he is to make public his predictions of their planet's imminent doom or otherwise attempt to "create a climate of panic."

When their murderous insurrection fails, the Council forces Jor-El to exile them to the Phantom Zone and never speak of his findings again, lest he face the same fate.

For this perceived betrayal, Zod declares that he will escape and conquer Krypton (confident that Jor-El will discover some way to save the planet) and force the scientist and his son to kneel before him one day.

Having been re-built via a Kryptonian crystal during the One Year Later story arc, the current version of the Fortress of Solitude, which is also designed to essentially be visually identical to the Donner and Bryan Singer films, now contains an advanced interactive "recording" of Jor-El which, although visually dissimilar to Marlon Brando, is otherwise identical in function to that featured in Superman Returns.

Superman/Batman #50 presents Jor-El sending a probe to Earth that makes contact with Thomas Wayne while he is on a drive with a pregnant Martha, the probe holographically transmitting Thomas' consciousness to Krypton so that Jor-El can better learn what kind of world Earth is to help him decide which of many possible candidates he should send his son to.

After being nursed back to health by locals, Jor-El sees firsthand the atrocities of man, as a dictator usurps all of what the people own, causing them to starve.

[13] In the Elliot S. Maggin 1978 novel Superman: Last Son of Krypton, Jor-El is shown as having sent a navigation probe ahead of Kal-El's spaceship, to find a suitable foster parent on his new planet.