Podcaster Joe Rogan noted earlier this week that he enjoys going to church and pushed back against "self-professed intelligent people" who dismiss the Bible as myth.
During the Wednesday episode of "The Joe Rogan Experience" with guest Konstantin Kisin, a Russian-British political commentator who said he "loves" going to church, Rogan said he feels the same and finds it encouraging when he is with Christians who are working to better understand the Bible.
"It's a bunch of people that are going to try to make their lives better, trying to be a better person," he said of church. "I mean, for me — at least the place that I go to — they read and analyze passages in the Bible. I'm really interested in what these people were trying to say, because I don't think it's nothing."
Rogan suggested "atheists and secular people" who dismiss the Bible as fiction are not as intelligent as they believe themselves to be.
"I hear that among self-professed intelligent people, like it's a fairy tale," he said. "I don't know that's true. I think I think there's more to it. I think it's history, but I think it's a confusing history. It's a confusing history because it was a long time ago, and it's people telling things in an oral tradition and writing things down in a language that you don't understand, in the context of a culture that you don't understand."
Explaining that he believes "there's something to it," Rogan went on to say that Christianity is "the most fascinating" of the world's religions because it centers on the person of Jesus Christ.
"Christianity in particular is the most fascinating to me, because there's this one person that everybody agrees existed, that somehow or another had the best plan for how human beings should interact with each other and behave," he said.
Rogan suggested that he is fascinated by the fact that Christ suffered and died, despite being "the best example" of how human beings should behave.
"[He] didn't even protest," he said. "Died on the cross, supposedly for our sins. It's a fascinating story. What does it represent, though? That's the real thing. What was that? What happened? Who was Jesus Christ, if it was a human being. What was that? That's wild."
When Kisin noted that the story of Jesus could be seen as a metaphor for "voluntary self-sacrifice" intended to inspire a better society, Rogan observed that the historical reality of Jesus as a human being is unavoidable.
"It's a historically documented human being, that's where it gets weird," he said. "Because there's a universal depiction of what this human being was like. That doesn't seem to vary that much between all the people that knew Him. That gets weird."
Rogan has increasingly mentioned Christianity on his podcast within the past year. In January, he hosted Christian apologist Wes Huff for an extensive conversation about faith, Jesus and the supernatural claims of the Bible.
In May, Huff revealed that Rogan had begun attending church regularly, and that the two have remained in contact since the spoke on the podcast.
"That has been a consistent thing," Huff said of Rogan's church attendance.
That same month, Rogan expressed skepticism about the Big Bang theory's explanation of the universe's origin, noting that he finds the idea of the Resurrection more plausible.
"It's funny, because people will be incredulous about the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, but yet, they're convinced that the entire universe was smaller than a head of a pin and that for no reason that anyone has adequately explained to me, instantaneously became everything? OK," he said.
"I'm sticking with Jesus on that one," he later added. "Jesus makes more sense. People have come back to life."
