The idea of a "golem," a manipulable soldier made out of magically animated mud or clay created to protect Jews during pogroms or other times of antisemitism, actually is a part of European-Jewish folklore and mythology. The earliest-known written description of a golem's creation dates from the late 1100s or early 1200s. The most famous version of the golem myth comes from 16th-Century Prague, where a Rabbi named Judah Loew ben Bezalel was fabled to have created a golem to protect Prague's Jews from pogroms. The vast majority of Jewish scholars, even strictly Orthodox ones, see the golem story as a piece of allegorical folklore and not something to be taken seriously in a religious context. See also the Trivia section for the "Supernatural" episode Everybody Hates Hitler.
The witches of Katrina's former coven strike a strong resemblance to the Reverend Mother character in Dune (1984), i.e. blue eyes, jagged teeth, distorted voice, black veil.