American comedian Katt Williams has spoken out on domestic abuse he suffered at the hands of his parents as a child after questioning the Bible.
Williams was interviewed by Steven Bartlett on the Diary of a CEO podcast, where he detailed historic abuse his parents which he experienced from the ages of five to 12 years old.
Raised by Jehovah's Witnesses in Dayton,Ohio, Williams revealed that he was questioning the Bible from a young age and that his parents used up to 2x4 pieces of wood to beat him unconscious.
The 55-year-old actor said he was searching for the truth and encountered passages which he found issue with. Williams said: "I've forgiven all the participants, but it doesn't make it any easier to peels the scabs off.
"It's such an important part of my life, because we need to be put in difficult situations to be able to find out what we're made of. I said too much and I would know what the repercussions were and still say it. The things I was questioning them on were a lot of the times biblical in nature.
"You're trying to instil upon me this particular truth that we collectively believe in and I'm explaining to you, 'I don't believe that'."
Williams elaborated on what he was searching for in his questioning of the Bible.
"It's going to have to be discussed because you told me the Bible was written by God – so I don't want to see any errors, I don't want to see any mistakes. I don't want to see a passage about how you should treat your slaves because now I have a different conversation that I need to have.
"Even at that point in my life, I just wanted to know what the truth was about those things, and I thought that was a safe place for it."
The stand-up comedian continued that he believes he has a relationship with God but is not religious.
"Early on in my life, I made a separation between God and made a relationship with Him from religious practices completely," he added.
"I assumed that for whatever nationality, creed or race the person was, their personal religion was their way of explaining and handling and dealing with a relationship with God.
"Even as an adult, I found that for the most part, regardless of what someone's religion is – the key thing is that they are attempting to get the people that follow them to be better people."