by Fr. Jonathan H. Cholcher
The Orthodox practice of the Christian Faith includes fasting as an essential aspect of its tradition. The earliest Christian writing outside of the New Testament states: “And your fastings, let them not be with the hypocrites; for they fast on the second and fifth days of the week (i.e., Monday and Thursday; see Lk. 18:12), but you, fast on the fourth day and on the preparation” (i.e., Wednesday and Friday; Didache, 8.1; ca. 100 A.D.). Likewise, Christians always fasted for a season connected with the yearly celebration of Pascha in the spring (Christ’s Crucifixion and Resurrection), whether that was for 40 hours, a few weeks, or for 40 or more days.
- Fasting from food exposes our true need for God.
Immediately following His baptism in the Jordan River and the revelation of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Spirit led Christ into the wilderness where He fasted for 40 days and nights “being tempted by the devil…when [the 40 days] had ended, He was hungry.” Fasting exposes true need because when tempted by the devil simply to turn stones into bread to satisfy physical hunger, Jesus answered: “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God’” (Lk. 4:1-4). Therefore, the practice of fasting demonstrates the authentic Christian life of self-control and obedience to God emulating the life of the Savior Jesus Christ Himself.
Jesus significantly quotes from Deuteronomy, chapter 8, which describes the purpose of Israel’s wandering in the wilderness for 40 years eating only the manna supplied by God each day. “[T]he Lord your God led you in the desert to deal harshly with you and test you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not” (Deut. 8:2). Fasting entirely from all or certain kinds of food and drink is a test, a trial, of our true inner desires, for the merely temporal or more so for the eternal nourishment which only God can provide. As our Lord teaches elsewhere, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled…But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you” (Matt. 5:6; 6:33).
In another place, being tired from His journey, Christ’s disciples returned to Him from going into the town to buy food. They urged Him to eat, but Jesus said to them, “I have food to eat of which you do not know…My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work” (Jn. 4:32, 34). Then after feeding the 5,000 who had followed Jesus into the wilderness without eating all day, He explained: “Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and are dead…I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world…My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed” (Jn. 6:49, 51, 55).
For this reason the Orthodox fast from physical food and drink anticipating the reception of our True Food at every Divine Liturgy. This is true of both morning Liturgies (e.g., Sundays and Feast days) and evening Liturgies (i.e., Vesperal and Presanctified Liturgies of Lent and Holy Week) to which we try to abstain from eating anything at least from midnight or noon, respectively, before receiving Communion. Jesus Christ is our first, or chief Food, our Daily Bread before all other foods on whom we truly breakfast (lit., break the fast).
[N.B. In the earliest years of the Church in imitation of Christ Himself, the Divine Liturgy usually took place in the evening in conjunction with a meal called an agape (lit., love-feast; Lk. 22:20; Acts 20:7; Jude 12). As the importance of the meal began to over-ride that of the Liturgy, the Divine Liturgy was transferred to the morning, thus as a rule preceded by the practice of fasting.]
- Fasting is a sign of true repentance, that is, reorienting our desires toward God and His will.
Once the disciples of John the Baptist came to Jesus, asking, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but Your disciples do not fast?” Jesus replied, “Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast” (Matt. 9:14-15). Our Lord is speaking of Himself being taken away in His Crucifixion, Resurrection, and Ascension into heaven. On the eve of these events, Christ told His apostles, “It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper (Gk., Parakletos; Comforter, or Advocate, that is, the Holy Spirit) will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you” (Jn. 16:7), which happened fully on the Day of Pentecost inaugurating the time of the mission of the Apostolic Church.
The Apostle Paul describes this time of fasting in these terms: “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works” (Titus 2:11-14).
Some people may wonder why the Orthodox way includes so many fasting days and seasons during the year. Aren’t all these fast days excessive and unnecessary? The Orthodox are enjoined to fast:
- before receiving Communion;
- every Wednesday and Friday for 48 weeks of the year (excluding the 12 days of Christmas [Dec. 25 to Jan. 5], the first week of Pre-Lent [Publican and Pharisee], Bright Week after Pascha, and the week after Pentecost);
- on certain fixed days of every year: the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross (Sept. 14), the eves of Christmas and Theophany (Dec. 24 and Jan. 5), and the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist (Aug. 29);
- throughout the four fasting seasons of Advent (Nov. 15 to Dec. 24), Great Lent and Holy Week (47 days before Pascha), the Apostles Fast (8 days after Pentecost to June 29), and the Dormition Fast (Aug. 1-14).
Such a fasting rule exists, as Jesus indicates during this present age before His return in glory, because fasting is normal for the faithful. Fasting is the exercise of sobriety, righteousness, and godliness in a time of irreverence and sinful lusts. In other words, fasting is the exercise of repentance, the turning away from a life concerned only with self-satisfaction (i.e., gluttony, greed, and sensuality) to a life seeking to please God in the discernment of His saving will. To this end, the Church practices fasting in a deliberate and comprehensive way of the Faith (not the mechanical performance of a legal code).
Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk writes from the mind of the Church: “True and real fasting is abstinence from every evil. Christian, if you want fasting to be beneficial for you, then, while fasting bodily, do so also in the soul, and fast always. As you impose fasting on your belly, impose it on your evil thoughts and whims…Repent and, abstaining from every evil word, deed, and thought, and learn every virtue, and you will always be fasting in the sight of God” (from A Gathering of Spiritual Riches).
As a sign of genuine repentance and reorientation toward God, fasting is accompanied by and completed with:
- confession of and mourning for sins (Joel 1:13; 2:12; Dan. 9:3f.);
- humility (Jonah 3:5-9);
- prayer, both personal and corporate (Matt. 17:21; Acts 13:2-3);
- reading the word of God with obedience to it (Neh. 9);
- almsgiving and love of neighbor (Tob. 12:8-9; Isa. 58:6-10; Zech. 7:9-10). In the second century Shepherd of Hermas, Similitude 5, chapter 3, Christians are advised to give the money saved from fasting to others in need (e.g., widows and orphans).
Fasting in the sight of God manifests itself with these accompanying works which are virtues continually enjoined on all Christians as proofs of genuine repentance and new life in Christ and the Holy Spirit.
- Fasting, to be of value, must be done in a holy way, that is, devoted to God in faith and love.
The Lord said through the Prophet Joel: “Sanctify a fast” (1:14; 2:15). If we are going to fast as we most certainly should, then our fasting must be done in a holy way; it must be sanctified. The Apostle Peter writes: “Therefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in your ignorance; but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, ‘Be holy, for I am holy’” (1 Pet. 1:13-15; Lev. 11:45).
Fasting is sanctified not merely by the outward keeping of the rules of fasting. For instance, the most basic rule of fasting is to abstain entirely from all food and drink for a day or short span of days. The Jews practiced this rule on the Day of Atonement (Heb., Yom Kippur; Lev. 23:26-32; Acts 27:9) and other days of historical commemoration (Zech. 7:5). This is the original fasting rule for Wednesdays and Fridays, and for the ancient 40-hour fast prior to the Paschal Liturgy.
Another rule of fasting is to abstain from certain types of food and drink for a longer span of days, weeks, or even years. Nazarites abstained entirely from wine and alcoholic drinks and any product of the grape-vine (Num. 6:3-4). The Jews were forbidden to ever eat animals designated “unclean” or to ever consume blood (Lev. 11, 17:1-14). Daniel and his three friends consumed only vegetables and water for 10 days, abstaining from the food and wine of the Babylonian king (Dan. 1:12). Orthodox monks, as a general rule, never eat meat. During the fasting seasons of the Church year, the canonical fasting rule of the Church is called xerophagia (Gk., “dry-eating”), that is, general abstention from animal products (all flesh, dairy, and eggs), wine and alcoholic drinks, and cooking with olive oil.
Yet holiness, with anything including fasting, does not consist simply in the outward keeping of the law. To be holy our outer conduct must conform to and express our inner state of devotion to God. Jesus said: “Do you not perceive that whatever enters a man from the outside cannot defile him, because it does not enter his heart, but his stomach, and is eliminated, thus purifying all foods? What comes out of a man, that defiles a man…out of the heart” (Mk. 7:18-20). Likewise Christ said to the Pharisees: “[F]irst cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also” (Matt. 23:26).
“Sanctify a fast.” How? “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from Your presence, and do not take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, and uphold me with Your guiding Spirit. I will teach transgressors Your ways, and the ungodly shall turn back to You” (Ps. 50:12-15).
The Apostle writes in this regard: “But food does not commend us to God; for neither if we eat are we the better, nor if we do not eat are we the worse. But beware lest somehow this liberty of yours become a stumbling block to those who are weak…Therefore, if food makes my brother stumble (in the faith), I will never again eat meat (because of its association with idols), lest I make my brother stumble” (1 Cor. 8:8-9, 13). The goal of fasting is purifying our inner disposition in faith toward God and love of our neighbor encouraging his or her faith toward God. Fasting together in the Church is a great help toward this goal.
Again, “For one believes he may eat all things, but he who is weak eats only vegetables. Let not him who eats despise him who does not eat, and let not him who does not eat judge him who eats; for God has received him…One person esteems one day above another; another esteems every day alike. Let each be fully convinced in his own mind…For none of us lives to himself, and no one dies to himself…Therefore, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s” (Rom. 14:3, 5, 7, 8).
In the history of the Church, there has been considerable regional variety in the practice of fasting, particularly regarding the length, character, and number of the fasting seasons of the Church year (see Ecclesiastical History, V.22, by Socrates Scholasticus). Despite the variety, one thing remains constant: the act of fasting itself as an essential aspect of living out the Christian faith, however fasting is defined outwardly in its details of conduct. The one constant of Orthodox fasting is the pursuit of holiness in the putting off of sins and passionate desires (beginning with the moderation of food and drink) transforming them into desires for the things of God.
As with the accompanying disciplines of almsgiving and prayer, our Lord says of fasting: “Moreover, when you fast, do not be like the hypocrites (lit., actors), with a sad countenance…But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that you do not appear to men to be fasting, but to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly” (Matt. 6:16-18). Though the Church prescribes days, seasons, and conditions of fasting which are all conspicuously public, the ultimate standard of fasting is purity of heart and a blameless conscience in one who is trying to live a virtuous life according to Christ and not the world.
- Finally, sanctify a fast!
The command to “sanctify a fast” is similar to other commands. “Remember (or, observe) the Sabbath Day to keep it holy” (lit., to sanctify it; Ex. 20:8; Deut. 5:12). “Hallowed be Thy name” (lit., may Thy name be sanctified; Matt. 6:9). “Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts” (1 Pet. 3:15). Clearly, the Sabbath Day, God the Father’s name, and the Lord God are holy in and of themselves and non-negotiable aspects of the lives of the faithful. They are revealed as holy among us depending how we use or treat them. The same holds true with fasting.
First, as Christians we are to practice fasting, period. Neglecting or refusing to fast is the one sure way of misusing it. Fasting is a tool for working on our habitual sins and passionate desires, and only by using that tool will we begin to discover what and how extensive those passions are. So we abstain from certain foods and drinks. We begin to limit the amount of food and drink we ingest. We carefully control our intake of sensory distractions and entertainments (e.g., mass and social media outlets, sporting events, restaurants, etc.), to whatever we’ve become addicted consciously or unconsciously. The Church’s fasting guidelines are very helpful because they have been perfected with 2,000 years of experience. We use them according to our spiritual and physical abilities to grow in holiness.
Second, the fast is sanctified because in repentance, faith, and love, it brings us into closer communion with God. As we strip away mindless attachments to food, drink, and other sensual pleasures, we become free to pursue the enduring, eternal treasure of life with God in Christ. The other tools along with fasting aid in this work: confession, humility, prayer (both private and the services of the Church), searching God’s Word to do it, almsgiving and love of neighbor. Our fundamental desires are re-focused away from self-gratification to pleasing God our Creator and peace with others.
As with any exercise of any physical and spiritual abilities, fasting will bring hunger, discomfort, fatigue, and even pain. These are parts of the price to be paid for true spiritual health, or as Christ Jesus calls it, the “cost” of being His disciple (Lk. 14:25-35). The reward of such expense and training, though, is eternal life.
“Brethren, join in following my example, and note those who so walk, as you have us for a pattern. For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame – who set their mind on earthly things. For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself” (Phil. 3:17-21; italics mine).
