Joe Rogan suggests key Bible prophet was actually just high on drugs

Controversial Spotify podcaster Joe Rogan is no stranger to airing troubling views on religion in episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience – with the UFC commentator previously being slammed by comedian David Baddiel for spreading “racist myths about Jews”, leading TikTokers to spout a baseless ‘Adam and Eve’ conspiracy theory about the climate crisis, and sharing videos on Instagram which compared coronavirus vaccines to the Holocaust.

Now, in his latest comments on the topic of religion, Rogan appears to suggest that the prophecy of Moses was actually the result of hallucinogenic experiences.Towards the end of an episode featuring writer and documentarian David Holthouse, released on Tuesday, Rogan read a lengthy passage relating to the story of Ezekiel, who saw four creatures in the sky which each “had four faces and four wings”.

After Rogan finished reading the passage, Holthouse commented: “I mean, to anybody that’s done DMT [dimethyltryptamine] or ayahuasca – really tripped on psychedelics – you read that and it feels sort of familiar … The glory of God, these visions of these beings.

Rogan chimed in: “And the fact that these things are constantly changing their experience. That’s the thing about the DMT experience, it’s not a stationary static experience, it’s like constantly changing and moving in front of you.

“And to see something like that in the sky, and the fact that it’s so noteworthy that they wrote it down in the f***ing Bible…”

DMT is a Class A, plant-based drug in the UK, and according to the Australian Alcohol and Drug Foundation, it is the psychoactive element of ayahuasca and can bring about intense, short-term hallucinations.

When Holthouse suggested “maybe [Ezekiel] found some of those mushrooms”, Rogan replied: “Maybe.”

The podcaster then went on to add: “There’s a university in Israel – I think it’s the University of Jerusalem – that theorised that the Moses experience of the burning bush was a DMT experience.

“When you say that ‘Moses saw the burning bush’, well, what kind of bush would burn that would give you a psychedelic experience? Well, the acacia tree.

“The acacia tree, which is very common to that area, is rich with DMT and how do you psychoactively acquire DMT? You smoke it.

“So you’re smoking this tree – this burning bush – and you’re seeing God, and God has brought you Ten Commandments of how to live life, which sounds like a lot of what you experience when you have the DMT experience. When you have that and you have these contact with the entities, they kind of give you guidelines on how to live.”

What Rogan was actually referencing when talking about the Israeli university is remarks from cognitive psychology professor Benny Shanon at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem from 2008.

In that year he published a study on Moses and psychedelic drugs, and told Israel Radio: “As far as Moses on Mount Sinai is concerned, it was either a supernatural cosmic event (which I don’t believe), or a legend (which I don’t believe either), or finally – and this is very probable – an event that joined Moses and the people of Israel under the effects of narcotics.”

NBC News reported at the time that Shanon wrote: “In advanced forms of ayahuasca inebriation, the seeing of light is accompanied by profound religious and spiritual feelings.”

However, in an opinion piece by Shanon published in The Guardian in March 2008 with the headline “I never said Moses was stoned when he saw God”, the professor clarified his stance on the issue.

“I would like to assure you that I have the deepest respect for Moses, the Jewish tradition and religious faith in general … I agree with Rabbi Pete Tobias (Face to Faith) that the spiritual, cultural and historical import of the biblical events, and of their associated texts and religious messages, is not diminished by their association with psychoactive plants,” he wrote.

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