Is Fasting Out-of-Date?

“I HAVE been fasting every Monday since I was a teenager,” says Mrudulaben, a prosperous 78-year-old Indian woman. This has been a part of her worship, a way to ensure that she had a good marriage and healthy children, as well as protection for her husband. Now a widow, she continues to fast on Mondays for good health and for the prosperity of her children. Like her, the majority of Hindu women make regular fasts part of their life.

Prakash, a middle-aged businessman living in a suburb of Mumbai (Bombay), India, says that he fasts every year on the Mondays of Sawan (Shravan). This is a month of special religious significance on the Hindu calendar. Prakash explains: “I started out for religious reasons, but now I find an added incentive to continue for health purposes. Since Sawan comes toward the end of the monsoon, it gives my system a chance to cleanse itself of illnesses peculiar to the rainy season.”

Some feel that fasting helps a person physically, mentally, and spiritually. For instance, the Grolier International Encyclopedia states: “Recent scientific research suggests that fasting may be healthful and, when engaged in carefully, may bring about heightened states of consciousness and sensibility.” It is said that Greek philosopher Plato would fast for ten days or more and that the mathematician Pythagoras made his students fast before he taught them.

To some, fasting means total abstinence from food and water for a fixed period of time, while others take liquids during their fasts. Missing certain meals or refraining from a particular type of food is considered fasting by many. But long-term unsupervised fasting can be hazardous. Journalist Parul Sheth says that after the body has drawn on its store of carbohydrates, it next converts muscle proteins into glucose and then turns to the body fat. Changing fat into glucose releases toxic products called ketone bodies. As these accumulate, they move to the brain, harming the central nervous system. “This is when fasting can turn dangerous,” says Sheth. “You can get confused, disoriented, and worse. . . . [It can cause] coma and eventually death.”

An Instrument and a Ritual

Fasting has been used as a powerful tool for political or social ends. A prominent wielder of this weapon was Mohandas K. Gandhi in India. Held in high esteem by hundreds of millions of people, he used fasting to exert a strong influence on India’s Hindu masses. Describing the result of his fast to settle an industrial dispute between mill laborers and mill owners, Gandhi said: “The net result of it was that an atmosphere of goodwill was created all round. The hearts of the mill-owners were touched . . . The strike was called off after I had fasted only for three days.” South Africa’s president, Nelson Mandela, participated in a five-day hunger strike during his years as a political prisoner.

The majority of those who have made a practice of fasting, though, have done so for religious reasons. Fasting is a prominent ritual in Hinduism. On certain days, states the book Fast and Festivals of India, “complete fast is observed . . . even water is not taken at all. Both men and women observe strict fast . . . to ensure happiness, prosperity and forgiveness of transgressions and sins.”

Fasting is widely practiced in the Jain religion. The Sunday Times of India Review reports: “A Jain muni [sage] in Bombay [Mumbai] drank just two glasses of boiled water a day—for 201 days. He lost 33 kg [73 lb].” Some even fast to the point of starving themselves to death, convinced that this will bring salvation.

For adults in general practicing Islam, fasting is obligatory during the month of Ramadan. No food or water may be taken from sunrise to sunset for the entire month. Anyone ill or on a journey during this time must make up the days of the fast. Lent, the 40-day period preceding Easter, is a time of fasting for some in Christendom, and many religious orders observe fasts on other specified days.

Fasting has certainly not died out. And since it is a part of so many religions, we may ask, Is fasting required by God? Are there occasions when Christians may decide to fast? Can this be beneficial? The next article will discuss these questions.

[Picture on page 3]

The Jain religion views fasting as a way to achieve the salvation of the soul

[Picture on page 4]

Mohandas K. Gandhi used fasting as a powerful tool for political or social ends

[Picture on page 4]

In Islam, fasting is obligatory during the month of Ramadan

[Credit Line]

Garo Nalbandian