Reference: Fasts
Smith
Fasts.
1. One fast only was appointed by the Mosaic law, that on the day of atonement. There is no mention of any other periodical fast in the Old Testament except in
From these passages it appears that the Jews, during their captivity, observed four annual fasts, --in the fourth, fifth, seventh and tenth months.
2. Public fasts were occasionally proclaimed to express national humiliation and to supplicate divine favor. In the case of public danger the proclamation appears to have been accompanied with the blowing of trumpets.
(See
1Sa 7:6; 2Ch 20:3; Jer 36:6-10
) Three days after the feast of tabernacles, when the second temple was completed, "the children of Israel assembled with fasting, and with sackclothes and earth upon them," to hear the law read and to confess their sins.
3. Private occasional fasts are recognized in one passage of the law --
The instances given of individuals fasting under the influence of grief, vexation or anxiety are numerous.
4. In the New Testament the only reference to the Jewish fasts are the mention of "the fast" in
(generally understood to denote the day of atonement) an the allusions to the weekly fasts.
Mt 9:14; Mr 2:18; Lu 5:33; 18:12; Ac 10:30
These fasts originated some time after the captivity.
5. The Jewish fasts were observed with various degrees of strictness. Sometimes there was entire abstinence from food.
etc. On other occasions there appears to have been only a restriction to a very plain diet.
Those who fasted frequently dressed in sackcloth or rent their clothes, put ashes on their head and went barefoot.
6. The sacrifice of the personal will, which gives to fasting all its value, is expressed in the old term used in the law, afflicting the soul.
See Verses Found in Dictionary
"Any vow or sworn obligation that would bring affliction to her, her husband can confirm or nullify.
After they had assembled at Mizpah, they drew water and poured it out before the Lord. They fasted on that day, and they confessed there, "We have sinned against the Lord." So Samuel led the people of Israel at Mizpah.
When Ahab heard these words, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth, and fasted. He slept in sackcloth and walked around dejected.
On the twenty-fourth day of this same month the Israelites assembled; they were fasting and wearing sackcloth, their heads covered with dust.
"You came down on Mount Sinai and spoke with them from heaven. You provided them with just judgments, true laws, and good statutes and commandments.
"Go, assemble all the Jews who are found in Susa and fast in my behalf. Don't eat and don't drink for three days, night or day. My female attendants and I will also fast in the same way. Afterward I will go to the king, even though it violates the law. If I perish, I perish!"
When they were sick, I wore sackcloth, and refrained from eating food. (If I am lying, may my prayers go unanswered!)
So you go there the next time all the people of Judah come in from their towns to fast in the Lord's temple. Read out loud where all of them can hear you what I told you the Lord said, which you wrote in the scroll. Perhaps then they will ask the Lord for mercy and will all stop doing the evil things they have been doing. For the Lord has threatened to bring great anger and wrath against these people." read more. So Baruch son of Neriah did exactly what the prophet Jeremiah had told him to do. He read what the Lord had said from the scroll in the temple of the Lord. All the people living in Jerusalem and all the people who came into Jerusalem from the towns of Judah came to observe a fast before the Lord. The fast took place in the ninth month of the fifth year that Jehoiakim son of Josiah was ruling over Judah. At that time Baruch went into the temple of the Lord. He stood in the entrance of the room of Gemariah the son of Shaphan who had been the royal secretary. That room was in the upper court near the entrance of the New Gate. There, where all the people could hear him, he read from the scroll what Jeremiah had said.
I ate no choice food; no meat or wine came to my lips, nor did I anoint myself with oil until the end of those three weeks.
Blow the trumpet in Zion; sound the alarm signal on my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land shake with fear, for the day of the Lord is about to come. Indeed, it is near! It will be a day of dreadful darkness, a day of foreboding storm clouds, like blackness spread over the mountains. It is a huge and powerful army -- there has never been anything like it ever before, and there will not be anything like it for many generations to come! read more. Like fire they devour everything in their path; a flame blazes behind them. The land looks like the Garden of Eden before them, but behind them there is only a desolate wilderness -- for nothing escapes them! They look like horses; they charge ahead like war horses. They sound like chariots rumbling over mountain tops, like the crackling of blazing fire consuming stubble, like the noise of a mighty army being drawn up for battle. People writhe in fear when they see them. All of their faces turn pale with fright. They charge like warriors; they scale walls like soldiers. Each one proceeds on his course; they do not alter their path. They do not jostle one another; each of them marches straight ahead. They burst through the city defenses and do not break ranks. They rush into the city; they scale its walls. They climb up into the houses; they go in through the windows like a thief. The earth quakes before them; the sky reverberates. The sun and the moon grow dark; the stars refuse to shine. The voice of the Lord thunders as he leads his army. Indeed, his warriors are innumerable; Surely his command is carried out! Yes, the day of the Lord is awesome and very terrifying -- who can survive it? "Yet even now," the Lord says, "return to me with all your heart -- with fasting, weeping, and mourning. Tear your hearts, not just your garments!" Return to the Lord your God, for he is merciful and compassionate, slow to anger and boundless in loyal love -- often relenting from calamitous punishment. Who knows? Perhaps he will be compassionate and grant a reprieve, and leave blessing in his wake -- a meal offering and a drink offering for you to offer to the Lord your God! Blow the trumpet in Zion. Announce a holy fast; proclaim a sacred assembly!
In King Darius' fourth year, on the fourth day of Kislev, the ninth month, the word of the Lord came to Zechariah. Now the people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regem-Melech and their companions to seek the Lord's favor read more. by asking both the priests of the temple of the Lord who rules over all and the prophets, "Should we weep in the fifth month, fasting as we have done over the years?" The word of the Lord who rules over all then came to me, "Speak to all the people and priests of the land as follows: 'When you fasted and lamented in the fifth and seventh months through all these seventy years, did you truly fast for me -- for me, indeed? And now when you eat and drink, are you not doing so for yourselves?'" Should you not have obeyed the words that the Lord cried out through the former prophets when Jerusalem was peacefully inhabited and her surrounding cities, the Negev, and the Shephelah were also populated?
"The Lord who rules over all says, 'The fast of the fourth, fifth, seventh, and tenth months will become joyful and happy, pleasant feasts for the house of Judah, so love truth and peace.'
Then John's disciples came to Jesus and asked, "Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples don't fast?"
Now John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. So they came to Jesus and said, "Why do the disciples of John and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples don't fast?"
Then they said to him, "John's disciples frequently fast and pray, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours continue to eat and drink."
I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of everything I get.'
Cornelius replied, "Four days ago at this very hour, at three o'clock in the afternoon, I was praying in my house, and suddenly a man in shining clothing stood before me