#2562 - Dan McClellan

What It Covers

Joe Rogan speaks with biblical scholar Dan McClellan, who holds a PhD combining biblical studies and cognitive science of religion, across 161 minutes covering the historical construction of biblical texts, ancient Near Eastern religious traditions, the cognitive origins of deity concepts, archaeological discoveries including the Dead Sea Scrolls, and how ancient languages like Ugaritic illuminate pre-biblical mythology and the evolution of Israelite religion.

Key Questions Answered

• •Biblical Authorship Timeline: The Gospels were written decades after Jesus's death — Mark around 69–71 CE, Matthew 5–10 years later, Luke after that, John later still. Several Pauline epistles, including First and Second Timothy and Titus, were written 30+ years after Paul's death by unknown authors. Scholars call these "spurious Pauline epistles," and they contain theological positions that directly contradict the genuine Pauline letters, particularly around celibacy versus childbearing as a path to salvation.
• •Textual Additions to Scripture: Modern Bible translations have removed approximately 16 verses from the New Testament that appear in the King James Version, because manuscript discoveries since 1611 revealed these passages were added by later scribes. Codex Sinaiticus, dated to the mid-fourth century CE, visibly shows one such addition — Matthew 17:21 — scribbled in the margin before later manuscripts incorporated it into the main body of text, demonstrating the scribal editing process in real time.
• •Ancient Hebrew Origins: Ancient Hebrew script derives from Egyptian hieroglyphs, transformed in the Sinai Peninsula around 1700–1900 BCE. Scribes repurposed Egyptian symbols so each represented a single consonant sound — the first letter of the word the symbol depicted. A house symbol ("beit") became the "b" sound. This proto-Sinaitic script traveled to Phoenicia and then spread globally, making virtually every modern alphabet on Earth — except Korean Hangul — a descendant of this Phoenician system.
• •Ugaritic Literature and Biblical Parallels: The ancient city of Ugarit, discovered in 1929 when a farmer struck buried ruins in coastal Syria, yielded roughly 1,000 texts in a previously unknown language decoded using frequency analysis of its 30 cuneiform signs. Ugaritic texts reference Leviathan — called Lotan — as a seven-headed sea dragon, using phrasing nearly identical to Isaiah 27:1, written 500 years later. This confirms shared poetic traditions circulating across the ancient Near East long before biblical composition.
• •Cognitive Basis of Religion: The human brain evolved a hypersensitivity to detecting agents and agency in the environment — interpreting ambiguous stimuli as potentially threatening entities — because ancestors who assumed the rustling bush had teeth survived longer. This "agent detection" mechanism underlies religious belief formation. Scholar Ara Norenzayan's book *Big Gods* argues that belief in covertly monitoring deities enabled large-scale human cooperation beyond kinship groups by establishing shared behavioral norms enforced by an unseen, omnipresent observer.
• •Cannabis in Ancient Israelite Worship: Chemical analysis of burnt residue on incense altars excavated at Tel Arad — an eighth-century BCE Israelite fortress temple in the southern Negev — confirmed the presence of three distinct cannabis compounds. This constitutes direct archaeological evidence that cannabis was used in ancient Israelite religious ritual. The site also contained a standing stone representing the God of Israel, two incense altars, and inscriptions referencing "the house of Adonai," indicating a functioning temple outside Jerusalem.
• •Genesis Composition Date and Sources: Genesis was likely composed between the eighth and fifth centuries BCE, drawing primarily from Babylonian and Assyrian literature circulating during the Israelite exile — not directly from Sumerian tablets thousands of years older. The Tower of Babel narrative appears connected to the unfinished Tower of Etemenanki near Babylon, partially destroyed by Assyrians in the eighth century BCE. The closest textual parallels to Genesis creation accounts are Babylonian versions dated to around 600 BCE, not earlier Sumerian originals.