FASTING

Right now it's Ramadan, and Muslims are fasting everyday from sunrise to sunset for a month. some Buddhists, Christians, and Hindus often set aside days for fasting. In a few months it will be Yom Kippur, the holiest and most solemn day of the Jewish year. Jews will fast from sundown Friday to nighttime Saturday.

So one of the questions one might ask is –“What’s with the fasting?” Why suspend eating for a whole day or a whole month of days? It’s not the same as dieting. Nor is fasting the same as an eating disorder. So what’s the purpose?

There are a number of reasons people – in almost every religious tradition I know of – practice fasting. Literally, at a gut level it, fasting stops us from our usual running around and makes us pay attention in ways we didn’t before. We become aware of our body in ways that we didn’t before. We become aware of our dependency on food and those who make or prepare it in ways that we didn’t before. We become aware of how often we usually do things willy-nilly – like snack or how often we think we’re invincible. It empties us of our hubris and fills us with awareness of our fragility.

So fasting makes us aware. Rabbi Allan Lew in his book on the Jewish High Holidays, This Is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared: The Days of Awe as a Journey of Transformation, says that every tradition:

“ speaks of a kind of layered mindfulness, a sensibility that works up and out of the body, to the heart and then to the mind and finally to the soul.” (p. 190)

The Quran says that “fasting is proscribed to you…that you may learn self-restraint.” (Sura 2.183) Self restraint – there’s something to learn! It’s interesting that no human reaches maturity without learning self-restraint. Every religion, every society, every school, every family, binds us in some ways, keeps us in check somehow because to live in society – maybe even to live on our own – we need to learn self-restraint. As the Rolling Stones song lamented, “You can’t always get what you want.” And religious fasting makes you recognize the reality of that human condition.

The fasts of both Ramadan and Yom Kippur remind us that we live in a larger sphere than just our own bodies or our own lives. We are connected to a larger community. Others in the tradition are also going through the pangs of hunger and that unites us. Others in the world – through no choice of their own – are also going through the pangs of hunger and that unites us with them as well.

My friend Eboo Patel, an Ismaili Muslim who does a great deal of interfaith work, wrote a book about growing up as an American muslim. This is what he wrote about Ramadan:

"For a moment, I stopped thinking about my own gnawing stomach and dry throat, and thought for a moment about the people in the world whose hunger will not be lifted at sundown. And what was I doing for them? On a normal day, I do not think such thoughts. On a normal day, missing my daily cup of coffee or piece of chocolate puts me in a bad mood. But Ramadan is not a normal time. This is a month, in my view, not primarily about restraint, but about remembrance."

And one of the things Eboo remembers is what the Quran demands of all Muslims:

“Spend of your wealth, out of love for G-d, for your kin, for orphans, for the needy, for the wayfarer, for those who ask.” (Suara 2.177)

In Judaism the words of the prophet Isaiah are there to question and challenge our reasons for fasting. Resoundingly he claims that the purpose for the fast is:

“To let the oppressed go free;
To break off every yoke.
It is to share your bread with the hungry,
And to take the wretched poor into your home;
When you see the naked, to cloth him,
And not to ignore your own kin.” (Is. 6-7)

As well as connecting us to a larger community, fasting empties us. We are no longer 'full,' or 'full of it,' but now we have room to receive. For the Western religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, what we hope to receive is the word and the presence of God. By shutting down our satiated self absorbtion, we can listen to the Source, the Other. For the Eastern religions of Hinduism and Buddhism, the fasting allows us to stop focusing on our needs and desires, and allow true insight/knowledge/wisdom to enter us. There is a Buddhist story about a scholar interested in learning from the Zen Master. He begins by telling the Master all of his credentials, books, and knowledge. The Master says we will now have tea. As the Master pours the tea, the scholar keeps talking, until he notices the Master is still pouring after the cup is full. When he asks with shock why he Master is still pouring the tea when the cup is overflowing, the Master replied: You cannot fill a cup that is already full, nor can you teach a person who is already full."

So what’s with the fasting? We become aware of our humanity on a gut level. We practice self restraint. We remember that we are connected to a larger community than our own needs. We are reminded to help others. And we practice being empty so that we can spiritually receive. Not bad lessons to learn!