Religious fasting
Various religions prescribe or recommend religious or faith-based fasting. Examples from the Abrahamic religions include Lent in Christianity and Yom Kippur, Tisha B'av, Fast of Esther, Fast of Gedalia, the Seventeenth of Tammuz, and the Tenth of Tevet in Judaism. Muslims fast during the month of Ramadan each year. The fast includes refraining from consuming any food or liquid from the break of dawn until sunset.
Details of fasting practices differ. Oriental Orthodox Christians and Eastern Orthodox Christians fast during specified fasting seasons of the year, which include not only the better-known Great Lent, but also fasts on every Wednesday and Friday, together with extended fasting periods before Christmas, after Easter and in early August.
Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints fast for a full 24-hour period once per month – usually before the main meal on the first Saturday of the month and ending with the main meal on the following Sunday – this is termed by the church as fast and testimony weekend. Many church members use this time to pray and meditate to increase their spiritual strength. Many also use this time to bear testimony of the church at a special church service held on the first Sunday of each month. They also give the money they saved by their fast to the church which uses it for support of the poor. In addition, Latter-Day Saints may also fast and pray voluntarily for a full 24 or 48 hours when they feel that they need extra spiritual strength or guidance. Like Muslims, they refrain from all drinking and eating unless they are small children or are physically unable to fast; for example, diabetics are not expected to fast.
Fasting is also a feature of religions such as Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. Mahayana traditions that follow the Brahma's Net Sutra may recommend that the laity fast "during the six days of fasting each month and the three months of fasting each year". Members of the Baháʼí Faith observe a Nineteen-Day Fast from sunrise to sunset during March each year.
Baháʼí Faith
In the Baháʼí Faith, fasting is observed from sunrise to sunset during the Baháʼí month of ʻAlaʼ. Baháʼu'lláh established the guidelines in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas. It is the complete abstaining from both food and drink during daylight hours. Consumption of prescribed medications is not restricted. Observing the fast is an individual obligation and is binding on Baháʼís between 15 years and 70 years old.Exceptions to fasting include individuals younger than 15 or older than 70; those suffering illness; women who are pregnant, nursing, or menstruating; travellers who meet specific criteria; individuals whose profession involves heavy labor and those who are very sick, where fasting would be considered dangerous. For those involved in heavy labor, they are advised to eat in private and generally to have simpler or smaller meals than are normal.
Along with obligatory prayer, it is one of the greatest obligations of a Baháʼí. In the first half of the 20th century, Shoghi Effendi, explains: "It is essentially a period of meditation and prayer, of spiritual recuperation, during which the believer must strive to make the necessary readjustments in his inner life, and to refresh and reinvigorate the spiritual forces latent in his soul. Its significance and purpose are, therefore, fundamentally spiritual in character. Fasting is symbolic, and a reminder of abstinence from selfish and carnal desires."
Buddhism
monks and nuns following the Vinaya rules commonly do not eat each day after the noon meal. This is not considered a fast but rather a disciplined regimen aiding in meditation and good health.Fasting is practiced by lay Buddhists during times of intensive meditation, such as during a retreat. During periods of fasting, followers completely stay away from eating animal products, although they do allow consumption of milk. Furthermore, they also avoid eating processed foods and the five pungent foods which are: garlic, Welsh onion, wild garlic, garlic chives, and asafoetida.
The Middle Path refers to avoiding extremes of indulgence on the one hand and self-mortification on the other. Prior to attaining Buddhahood, prince Siddhartha practiced a short regime of strict austerity and following years of serenity meditation under two teachers which he consumed very little food. These austerities, undertaken alongside five other ascetics did not lead to progress in meditation, liberation, or the ultimate goal of nirvana. Henceforth, prince Siddhartha practiced moderation in eating which he later advocated for his disciples.
On Uposatha days, roughly once a week, lay Buddhists are instructed to observe the eight precepts which includes refraining from eating after noon until the following morning. The eight precepts closely resemble the ten vinaya precepts for novice monks and nuns. The novice precepts are the same with an added prohibition against handling money.
The Vajrayana practice of Nyung Ne is based on the tantric practice of Chenrezig. It is said that Chenrezig appeared to an Indian nun who had contracted leprosy and was on the verge of death. Chenrezig taught her the method of Nyung Ne in which one keeps the eight precepts on the first day, then refrains from both food and water on the second. Although seemingly against the Middle Way, this practice is to experience the negative karma of both oneself and all other sentient beings and, as such is seen to be of benefit. Other self-inflicted harm is discouraged.
Christianity
Fasting is a practice in several Christian denominations and is done both collectively during certain seasons of the liturgical calendar, or individually as a believer feels led by the Holy Spirit. In the traditional Black Fast, the observant abstains from food and liquids for a whole day until the evening, and at sunset, traditionally breaks the fast with a vegetarian meal. Christians normatively fasted in this way during Lent prior to the 6th century, though it continues in certain denominations such as the Coptic Orthodox Church.The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, written in the first century CE, directed Christians to fast on both Wednesdays, in remembrance of the betrayal of Christ by Judas on Spy Wednesday, and Fridays, in mourning of the crucifixion of Jesus on Good Friday. Historically, the Orthodox, Catholic, Anglican and Methodist denominations of Christianity have emphasized the importance of the Friday fast, which has traditionally involved fasting and abstinence from meat, lacticinia and alcohol.
The pattern of fasting and praying for forty days is seen in the Bible, on which basis the liturgical season of Lent was established. In the Torah, Moses went into the mountains for forty days and forty nights to pray and fast "without eating bread or drinking water" before receiving the Ten Commandments. Likewise, the prophet Elijah went into the mountains for forty days and nights to fast and pray "until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God" when "the word of the Lord came to him". The early Christian bishop Maximus of Turin wrote that as Elijah by "fasting continuously for a period of forty days and forty nights...merited to extinguish the prolonged and severe dryness of the whole world, doing so with a stream of rain and steeping the earth's dryness with the bounty of water from heaven", in the Christian tradition, this is interpreted as being "a figure of ourselves so that we, also fasting a total of forty days, might merit the spiritual rain of baptism... a shower from heaven might pour down upon the dry earth of the whole world, and the abundant waters of the saving bath might saturate the lengthy drought of the Gentiles." In the New Testament, Jesus went into the desert to fast and pray for forty days and forty nights; it was during this time that Satan tried to tempt him. The forty day and night fasts of Moses, Elijah, and Jesus prepared them for their work, and their examples were foundational to the establishment of Lent.
In Western Christianity, fasting is observed during the forty-day season of Lent by many communicants of the Catholic Church, Lutheran Churches, Anglican Communion, Moravian Church, Methodist Churches, Western Orthodox Churches, United Protestant Churches and certain Reformed Churches, to commemorate the fast observed by Christ during his temptation in the desert. While some Western Christians fast during the entire season of Lent, Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are nowadays emphasized by Western Christian denominations as the normative days of fasting within the Lenten season. In many Western Christian Churches, including those of the Catholic, Methodist and Baptist traditions, certain congregations have committed to undertaking the Daniel Fast during the whole season of Lent, in which believers practice abstinence from meat, lacticinia and alcohol for the entire forty days of the liturgical season. In certain denominations, such as the Coptic Orthodox Church, as well as in certain countries, such as India and Pakistan, many Christians observe the Black Fast throughout the whole season of Lent. After attending a worship service, often on Wednesday evenings, it is common for Christians of various denominations to break that day's Lenten fast together through a communal Lenten supper, which is held in the church's parish hall. Along with fasting, certain Christian denominations such as the Coptic Orthodox Church, enjoin sexual abstinence during Lent for believers "to give themselves time for fasting and prayer."
Many Christians fast before receiving Holy Communion. This is known as the Eucharistic Fast.
Catholicism
For Catholics, fasting, taken as a technical term, is the reduction of one's intake of food to one full meal and two small meals, both of which together should not equal the large meal. Eating solid food between meals is not permitted. Fasting is required of the faithful between the ages of 18 and 59 on specified days. Complete abstinence of meat for the day is required of those 14 and older. Meat is understood as that of warm-blooded land animals.In the Catholic Church, the forty days of Lent were days of fasting and abstinence from meat and lacticinia until these rules were relaxed by Pope Benedict XIV in Non Ambigimus and by Pope Leo XIII in Indultum quadragesimale. Prior to the closure of the Second Vatican Council in 1965, all of the weekdays of Lent, totaling forty days, were days of fasting in the Catholic Church, with Fridays and Saturdays being days of abstinence from meat; these rules continue to be observed by certain Traditional Catholics, such as those worshipping in the chapels of Congregation of Mary Immaculate Queen. Pope Pius XII initially relaxed some of the regulations concerning fasting in 1956. In 1966, Pope Paul VI in his apostolic constitution Paenitemini, changed the strictly regulated Catholic fasting requirements. He recommended that fasting be appropriate to the local economic situation, and that all Catholics voluntarily fast and abstain. In the United States, there are only two obligatory days of fast – Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. Though not under the pain of mortal sin, fasting on all forty days of Lent is "strongly recommended". The Fridays of Lent are days of abstinence. Pastoral teachings since 1966 have urged voluntary fasting during Lent and voluntary abstinence on the other Fridays of the year. The regulations concerning such activities do not apply when the ability to work or the health of a person would be negatively affected.