When one thinks of Dracula they would picture the typical fangs, long nose, slick-backed, black hair, capes and black clothes living in a castle in Transylvania. He lives in a coffin and only comes out at night to feast, transforming into a bat for travel, of course. However, Dracula is portrayed in different ways through various books and movies. He can turn humans into the undead, he is pretty much immortal, he has the ability to grow younger by drinking blood, he casts no shadow, he has no reflection, he has the ability to crawl along walls, he has the ability to control animals, he can control the weather and he also has the power to transform his own shape, hence the bat stereotype. Most people would not realize that there are many religious aspects that come from the monster Dracula. Count Dracula is a portrayal of very Anti-Christ values which are characterized especially in the bible, Bram Stoker's movie and Beal's book.
Blood is a major symbol when it comes to Dracula. From the beginning blood was seen as sin-like. For example when women menstruated, it was believed that God was punishing them for thinking sinfully. It was also a sin to have sexual intercourse with a female that was menstruating. "Only be sure that thou eat not the blood: for the blood is the life" (Deuteronomy 12:23). Vampires suck blood therefore they are sucking the life out of another in order to sustain their own lives. They are also sinful because they are not only drinking blood, but taking the blood from a female. He is basically making all of God's creation not pure. Even in Bram Stoker's movie the viewer hears Dracula yelling "The blood is life!" This is after he drinks the blood from the cross or the blood after he cuts Seward's wrist and laps the blood up. .
The drinking of blood by Dracula is much like a mocking of the Eucharist. At his last supper Jesus invites his people to drink his blood which is in the form of wine, in order to obtain eternal spiritual life.
