Why Orthodox Christians Fast: What the Church Asks, Where It Comes From, and What It Is For

Every Orthodox calendar is marked with fasts. Wednesday and Friday are fast days all year, four long seasons fill much of the rest, and the faithful fast before Holy Communion. To a person raised outside the Church this can look like a list of food rules. It is not. Fasting is the oldest and plainest discipline of the Christian life, taught by the Lord in the words "when ye fast," and the rules are the Church's way of making that command regular, shared and humble.¹

For the seasons of the year see The Orthodox Church Calendar: Pascha, Lent, and the Great Feasts; for fasting joined to prayer see Why Christians Fast: An Orthodox Guide to Prayer, Fasting, and the Jesus Prayer and Fasting Was Ordinary Christian Practice.

In brief

The Church asks four things. First, a weekly fast on Wednesday and Friday. Second, four fasting seasons: Great Lent with Holy Week, the Apostles' Fast, the Dormition Fast and the Nativity Fast, with a few single fast days. Third, a fast from all food and drink before Holy Communion. Fourth, that all of it be kept "according to our strength," under the guidance of one's priest, with the sick, the very old, small children and pregnant and nursing mothers exempt from the strict rule.

Thesis: the fast is a received apostolic practice, not a private diet and not a bargain with God. Its food rules are, in the words of one Orthodox guide, "only one part, the most external part, of a true fast." Its goal is the healing of the soul: prayer, repentance, mercy to the poor and freedom from the passions.

Fasting in Scripture

The Lord Himself fasted: "when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred" (Matthew 4:2). He did not say "if you fast" but "when ye fast," and He taught how: "anoint thine head, and wash thy face; That thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which is in secret" (Matthew 6:16-18). When John's disciples asked why His own disciples did not fast, He answered that the bridegroom was with them, "but the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast" (Matthew 9:15). The Church lives in those days.

The apostles did what He foretold. The prophets and teachers at Antioch "ministered to the Lord, and fasted" when the Holy Spirit called Barnabas and Saul, and "when they had fasted and prayed" they laid hands on them (Acts 13:2-3). Paul and Barnabas appointed elders in every church and "prayed with fasting" (Acts 14:23).

The prophets had already shown what fasting is. "Turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping... And rend your heart, and not your garments" (Joel 2:12-13). And when Israel fasted while quarrelling and oppressing, the Lord asked: "Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness... Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry?" (Isaiah 58:6-7).¹ Every later teaching of the Church keeps these two things together: real abstinence, and a changed heart.

The weekly fast: Wednesday and Friday

The oldest Christian rule outside the New Testament is already about weekdays. The Didache tells Christians: "let not your fasts be with the hypocrites; for they fast on the second and fifth day of the week; but fast on the fourth day and the Preparation (Friday)."² Scholars date the Didache from the first century to the second; the Catholic Encyclopedia reported "the commoner view" as placing it before 100 and reasoned that the shift of the fasts to Wednesday and Friday may have come just as early.³ The Didache gives no reason for the days. Later writers do. The Apostolic Constitutions, a Syrian church order compiled about 380, says that the Lord "commanded us to fast on the fourth and sixth days of the week; the former on account of His being betrayed, and the latter on account of His passion."⁴ Wednesday remembers the betrayal and Friday the Passion, and the Orthodox Church still keeps them so.¹⁹

The practice was widespread early. Tertullian, writing in the early third century after he had joined the Montanists, speaks of the "Stations" kept by the Church at large, which his opponents say "have withal days of their own (the fourth and sixth days of the week)," and he himself says that the ninth hour is one "which, on the fourth and sixth days of the week, we most highly honour."⁵ The Apostolic Canons then put the weekly fast into law: "If any bishop, presbyter, or deacon, or reader, or singer, does not fast the holy Quadragesimal fast of Easter, or the fourth day, or the day of Preparation, let him be deposed, unless he be hindered by some bodily infirmity. If he be a layman, let him be excommunicated" (Canon 69).⁶

Sunday, by contrast, is never a day of mourning. The Apostolic Canons penalize fasting on the Lord's day or on any Sabbath but one, with deposition for clergy and excommunication for laity (Canon 66), and the Synod of Gangra anathematized anyone who, "under pretence of asceticism," fasts on Sunday (Canon 18).⁷ The Church fasts in view of the Cross and rejoices in view of the Resurrection.

The four fasting seasons

The Orthodox Church in America lists four "canonical fasting periods": Great Lent, the Apostles' Fast, the Dormition Fast and the Nativity Fast.⁸

• Great Lent and Holy Week run from the first Monday of Lent through Great and Holy Saturday, and are, in the Pravmir guide's words, "the longest and strictest fasting season of the year."¹²
• The Apostles' Fast begins, according to Fr Stephen Freeman's OCA reflection, "on the second Monday after Pentecost" and ends on the feast of Sts Peter and Paul on June 29, so its length depends on the date of Pascha.⁹
• The Dormition Fast runs from August 1 to August 14, and "wine and oil are allowed only on Saturdays and Sundays (and sometimes on a few feast days and vigils)."
• The Nativity Fast (St Philip's Fast) runs from November 15 to December 24.

The same OCA outline names single fast days: the Elevation of the Cross (September 14), the Beheading of St John the Baptist (August 29) and the Eve of Theophany (January 5). It also lists fast-free periods when the weekly fast is lifted, among them Bright Week after Pascha, the days from Christmas to January 4, the week after the Sunday of the Publican and Pharisee, and Trinity Week. On the Annunciation (March 25) and Palm Sunday "fish is permitted as well as wine and oil, but meat and animal products are not allowed."⁸ Feasts are as much part of the rule as fasts.

Lent itself is attested early in its shape. The Synod of Laodicea in the fourth century orders: "The fast must not be broken on the fifth day of the last week in Lent... but it is necessary to fast during all the Lenten season by eating only dry meats" (Canon 50).¹⁰ The Council in Trullo (692), writing to the whole Church, ruled that no one should eat eggs and cheese on the Sabbaths and Sundays of Lent: "the whole Church of God which is in all the world should follow one rule and keep the fast perfectly" (Canon 56).¹¹

What the fast means for food

A widely used English guide summarizes the weekly rule: "Unless a fast-free period has been declared, Orthodox Christians are to keep a strict fast every Wednesday and Friday." The foods avoided are meat and meat products, fish with backbones (shellfish are permitted), eggs and dairy, olive oil, and wine and other alcohol.¹² Lent adds a longer, graded discipline, and the Orthodox Church in America's textbook states the core: "No meat is allowed after Meatfare Sunday, and no eggs or dairy products after Cheesefare Sunday."¹³ The Apostles' and Nativity fasts are milder.

These details vary; in the words of the Lenten Triodion, "Neither in ancient nor in modern times has there ever been exact uniformity."⁸ Jurisdictions, monasteries and calendars differ, and your priest tells you how the rule applies to you. What does not vary is the point made in the same guide: it is "easy to keep the letter of the fasting rule and still practice gluttony," so "we should eat simply and modestly."¹²

The fast before Holy Communion

There is another fast that has nothing to do with seasons. The African canons gathered at Carthage in 419 allow the sacraments of the altar to be celebrated only "by those who are fasting," except on the anniversary of the Lord's Supper (Canon 41).¹⁵ The Council in Trullo quotes the rule, "the holy mysteries of the altar are not to be performed but by men who are fasting," and abolishes the exception: "it is not right to break the fast on the fifth feria of the last week of Lent" (Canon 29).¹⁴ Those canons name the celebrants, but the fast was kept by all who received. St Augustine wrote in 400 that "the sacrament is everywhere partaken of by persons fasting," because "it pleased the Holy Spirit to appoint, for the honour of so great a sacrament, that the body of the Lord should take the precedence of all other food entering the mouth of a Christian."²⁰ The Russian Orthodox Church's 2015 document on the Eucharist states the rule today: "the complete abstinence from food and drink from midnight until holy communion," which "is not applied to infants," to the gravely ill who need regular medicine or food, or "to those who are dying."²¹ It is not a diet but reverence: the first thing we receive on that day is Christ. For the reason the Eucharist is received only by the Orthodox faithful see Why Can't Non-Orthodox Christians Receive Communion in an Orthodox Church?, and for what the Liturgy is see What Happens During the Divine Liturgy?

Economia: the sick, the weak and the young

The Church fasts as a hospital, not as a barracks. The Apostolic Canon already excepted "bodily infirmity." The guide quoted above states the present practice plainly: "The Church has always exempted small children, the sick, the very old, and pregnant and nursing mothers from strict fasting," and "exceptions to the fast based on medical necessity (as with diabetes) are always allowed."¹² The Lenten Triodion agrees: "It has always been held that these rules of fasting should be relaxed in the case of anyone elderly or in poor health."⁸ The guide adds: "We are always advised to fast according to our strength," and recommends deciding any extra disciplines "in consultation with your priest." The Church calls this economia, the pastoral adjustment of a rule for the good of a person; it is a mercy, not a loophole, and it belongs to the priest and the penitent together, not to the person's own convenience. Our own counsel, not a canon: anyone with a medical condition or a history of disordered eating should speak to both a doctor and a priest before fasting; the point of the fast is never to make us ill.

Chrysostom shows the same mind. Preaching on the Gospel, he says that "if thy body be too weak to fast continually, still it is not too weak for prayer," and "although thou canst not fast, yet canst thou avoid luxurious living; and even this is no little thing, nor far removed from fasting."¹⁶

Economia is also a check against pride. The Synod of Gangra, in the fourth century, condemned two opposite errors. It anathematized anyone who condemns a faithful Christian for eating meat "as though the man were without hope because of his eating" (Canon 2), and any ascetic who, "without bodily necessity," shall "behave with insolence and disregard the fasts commonly prescribed and observed by the Church, because of his perfect understanding in the matter" (Canon 19). Its epilogue says it writes "not to cut off those who wish to lead in the Church of God an ascetic life, according to the Scriptures; but those who carry the pretence of asceticism to superciliousness; both exalting themselves above those who live more simply."⁷ The strict must not despise the weak, and no one may set a private rule above the Church's common fasts. Paul says the same on the first side: "Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth" (Romans 14:3).¹

What fasting is for

St Basil the Great, in his first homily on fasting, tells his hearers not to measure the fast by the menu: "Do not, however, define the benefit that comes from fasting solely in terms of abstinence from foods. For true fasting consists in estrangement from vices." He gives examples that still sting: "You do not eat meat, but you devour your brother. You abstain from wine, but do not restrain yourself from insulting others. You wait until evening to eat, but waste your day in law courts."¹⁷ That is Isaiah 58 in a Christian pulpit.

Fr Thomas Hopko's textbook for the Orthodox Church in America says the same of Lent: its goal is "the purification of our lives, the liberation of our souls and bodies from sin," and the rules exist "not as an end in themselves, but as a means to spiritual perfection crowned in love." It quotes the Church's own Lenten hymn: the true fast is "the casting off of evil, the bridling of the tongue, the cutting off of anger."¹³ Four fruits are named again and again.

1. Prayer. Chrysostom: "He that fasts is light, and winged, and prays with wakefulness, and quenches his wicked lusts, and propitiates God, and humbles his soul when lifted up."¹⁶ For the daily practice see How to Pray at Home and The Jesus Prayer.
2. Mercy. The same homily draws the line from fasting to giving: he who prays and fasts "hath not many wants," so he "cannot be covetous; he that is not covetous, will be also more disposed for almsgiving." What the fast saves is meant for the poor (Isaiah 58:7).
3. Self-mastery. A person who cannot say no to a meal will find it harder to say no to anger, lust and pride. This is why the Church's teaching on the passions treats fasting as a medicine; see Sin, Passion, and Spiritual Healing in Orthodoxy.
4. Humility and unity. We fast together, in one calendar, under a spiritual father, and without display (Matthew 6:17-18).

Fasting does not earn salvation. We are saved by the grace of God in synergy with our effort, within the life of the Church; fasting is part of that effort, a healing discipline taught by the Physician and not a payment to an angry God.

Two objections

"Jesus said it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a man." He did: "Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man" (Matthew 15:11). That sentence was about the Pharisees' ritual hand-washing, not about fasting; the same Lord had said "when ye fast" nine chapters earlier. Food is not unclean. We fast from clean things so as to rule ourselves. Paul's "meat commendeth us not to God: for neither, if we eat, are we the better; neither, if we eat not, are we the worse" (1 Corinthians 8:8) says the same: eating is not the virtue, and neither is abstaining. The virtue is obedience, love and repentance.¹

"Is this not legalism?" The danger is real, and the Church named it long ago: Gangra's anathemas against spiritual pride, Basil's warning about the "fast" that quarrels and sues, and Paul's "Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink" (Colossians 2:16). But the answer to abuse is not to abolish the fast. A rule shared by the whole Church spares each person from inventing his own, and economia keeps it from becoming a weight on the weak.¹

Where to begin

A person new to the Church does not start with the strictest rule. Keep Wednesday and Friday as far as your health and household allow, and add prayer on those days. Keep Great Lent as your priest directs, and the other fasts as your strength grows. Do not judge others, and give to the poor what the fast saves. Ask your priest.

What we can say confidently

• The Lord fasted, said "when ye fast," and foretold that His disciples would fast after the bridegroom was taken away (Matthew 4:2; 6:16; 9:15); the apostolic Church fasted (Acts 13:2-3; 14:23). Rating: Very Strong.
• Wednesday and Friday were set as fast days in very early Christian practice, the Didache already naming them, and the canons put them into law (Apostolic Canon 69). Rating: Very Strong.
• The canons forbid fasting on Sundays and also condemn contempt for the Church's fasts and pride in asceticism (Apostolic Canon 66; Gangra 2, 18, 19). Rating: Strong.
• The Church's rule has always made allowance for bodily infirmity, and the modern Orthodox guides exempt the sick, the very old, small children and pregnant and nursing mothers from the strict rule. Rating: Strong.
• The Fathers teach that the fast is for the healing of the soul, not for the food: Basil, Chrysostom and the Church's own textbooks agree. Rating: Very Strong.

What remains disputed

• The date of the Didache, and so how early the Wednesday and Friday fast is attested, is discussed by scholars; the Church's practice does not depend on it.
• The reasons given for Wednesday and Friday (the betrayal and the Cross) come from later writers; the Didache itself gives none.
• "Prayer and fasting" in Matthew 17:21 and Mark 9:29: the critical Greek text (the SBL edition) omits Matthew 17:21 and has only "prayer" in Mark 9:29, while the Byzantine text has "prayer and fasting" in both. The Church reads the received text, and Chrysostom comments on Matthew 17:21; the practice of fasting does not rest on those verses.¹⁸
• The details of the food rule (shellfish, vegetable oils, beer, the treatment of Saturdays and Sundays in Lent, the Apostles' Fast in years when the new calendar is used) differ between jurisdictions, monasteries and calendars. These are pastoral questions for your priest.

Conclusion

The Orthodox Christian fasts because the Lord said "when ye fast," because the apostles did, and because the Church has kept the discipline for two thousand years with a hospital's mercy and a soldier's seriousness. The weekly fast, the four seasons and the fast before the Chalice are one rule with one purpose: to loosen the grip of the passions, to make room for prayer and to open the hand to the poor. Keep it with the Church and under a priest, and you will find what Basil promised, that the fast is not about food. To see how the whole life of the Church holds together, continue to Why Orthodoxy.

Notes

1. All Scripture is the King James Version as served by this site's Bible API (https://honestapologist.com/api/bible/connections/texts), read 2026-11-08: Matthew 4:1-2; 6:16-18; 9:14-15; 15:10-11; Acts 13:2-3; 14:23; Joel 2:12-13; Isaiah 58:3-7; Romans 14:3; 1 Corinthians 8:8; Colossians 2:16-17.
2. The Didache 8.1, trans. M. B. Riddle, ANF vol. 7 (New Advent text), https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0714.htm.
3. John Chapman, "Didache," The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 4 (1908), on the date (Chapman himself favours 65-80 and reports Harnack's 131-160), https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04779a.htm.
4. Apostolic Constitutions 5.15, trans. James Donaldson, ANF vol. 7, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/07155.htm. Date and origin: J. B. Peterson, "Apostolic Constitutions," The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 1 (1907), which gives Syria (probably Antioch) and "about the year 380, without excluding the possibility of a date two decades earlier or later," https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01636a.htm.
5. Tertullian, On Fasting 2 and 10, trans. S. Thelwall, ANF vol. 4, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0408.htm. Date and context: John Chapman, "Tertullian," The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 14 (1912), https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14520c.htm, which places Tertullian's break with the Church in 211 or 212 and On Fasting after it, "a defence of the Montanist fasts."
6. The Apostolic Canons 66 and 69 (numbering of the Percival text), NPNF2 vol. 14, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3820.htm.
7. Synod of Gangra, Canons 2, 18 and 19 and Epilogue, trans. Henry R. Percival, NPNF2 vol. 14, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3804.htm.
8. Orthodox Church in America, "Fasting Seasons" (liturgics outline), https://www.oca.org/liturgics/outlines/fasting-fast-free-seasons-of-the-church, read 2026-11-08. The page quotes "The Rules of Fasting" from The Lenten Triodion, trans. Mother Mary and Archimandrite Kallistos Ware (London: Faber and Faber, 1978), pp. 35-37.
9. Fr Stephen Freeman, "The Apostles' Fast," Orthodox Church in America reflections, https://www.oca.org/reflections/fr.-stephen-freeman/the-apostles-fast, read 2026-11-08.
10. Synod of Laodicea, Canon 50, trans. Henry R. Percival, NPNF2 vol. 14, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3806.htm.
11. Council in Trullo (692), Canon 56, NPNF2 vol. 14, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3814.htm.
12. "The Fasting Rules in the Orthodox Church," Pravmir (published 26 May 2006), https://pravmir.com/?p=122, read 2026-11-08 (the page gives its source as abbamoses.com). A parish and calendar guide, not an official canon; it is used here as a clear statement of present practice.
13. Thomas Hopko, "Lenten Fasting," in The Orthodox Faith, vol. 2 (Worship), Orthodox Church in America; the hymn it quotes is from Monday Vespers of the first week of Lent, https://www.oca.org/orthodoxy/the-orthodox-faith/worship/the-church-year/lenten-fasting, read 2026-11-08.
14. Council in Trullo, Canon 29, NPNF2 vol. 14, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3814.htm.
15. Council of Carthage (419), Canon 41 (Greek 44), trans. Henry R. Percival, NPNF2 vol. 14, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3816.htm.
16. St John Chrysostom, Homilies on the Gospel of Matthew 57, trans. George Prevost, rev. M. B. Riddle, NPNF1 vol. 10, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/200157.htm.
17. St Basil the Great, First Homily on Fasting (De ieiunio 1), section 10 (PG 31:181). English translation from the Greek of PG 31:164-184, first published in Orthodox Tradition 23, no. 3 (2006), pp. 6-16, translator not named, as reprinted by the Mystagogy Resource Center, https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2011/03/st-basil-greats-homily-on-fasting-3-of.html. A published translation of both fasting homilies is in St Basil the Great, On Fasting and Feasts, trans. Susan R. Holman and Mark DelCogliano (SVS Press, Popular Patristics 50), not used here.
18. Matthew 17:20-21 and Mark 9:29 compared in the SBL Greek New Testament and the 2018 Byzantine text (Robinson-Pierpont) as served by https://honestapologist.com/api/bible/connections/texts (versions sblgnt and rp2018), read 2026-11-08.
19. Orthodox Church in America, "Orthodox Fasting" (Questions and Answers): "Orthodox Christians fast on Wednesday in remembrance of the betrayal of Christ and on Fridays in remembrance of His crucifixion and death," https://www.oca.org/questions/dailylife/orthodox-fasting, read 2026-11-08.
20. St Augustine, Letter 54 (A.D. 400), to Januarius, ch. 6 (section 8), trans. J. G. Cunningham, NPNF1 vol. 1, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102054.htm.
21. Russian Orthodox Church, "On the Participation of the Faithful in the Eucharist," approved at the Hierarchal Consultation of 2-3 February 2015, section I, point 2 (English translation credited to Holy Trinity Monastery, Jordanville), https://www.pravmir.com/on-the-participation-of-the-faithful-in-the-eucharist, read 2026-11-08. It cites Carthage Canon 41 for the rule and allows the requirement to be eased for pregnant and nursing mothers at the spiritual father's discretion.

Bibliography

Scripture

• The Holy Bible, King James Version (1769 text); SBL Greek New Testament; Robinson-Pierpont Byzantine text (2018).

Fathers, councils and early texts

• The Didache. ANF vol. 7. The Apostolic Constitutions, Book 5. ANF vol. 7.
• Tertullian. On Fasting. ANF vol. 4.
• The Apostolic Canons; the Synods of Gangra and Laodicea; the Councils of Carthage (419) and in Trullo (692). NPNF2 vol. 14.
• John Chrysostom. Homilies on Matthew. NPNF1 vol. 10.
• Augustine. Letter 54, to Januarius. NPNF1 vol. 1.
• Basil the Great. First Homily on Fasting. PG 31; English in Orthodox Tradition 23.3 (2006).

Orthodox sources

• Orthodox Church in America. "Fasting Seasons" (quoting The Lenten Triodion, trans. Mother Mary and Kallistos Ware, 1978) and "Orthodox Fasting" (Questions and Answers).
• Hopko, Thomas. The Orthodox Faith, vol. 2, "Lenten Fasting." Orthodox Church in America.
• Freeman, Stephen. "The Apostles' Fast." Orthodox Church in America.
• Russian Orthodox Church. "On the Participation of the Faithful in the Eucharist." 2015.
• "The Fasting Rules in the Orthodox Church." Pravmir.

Reference

• Peterson, J. B. "Apostolic Constitutions." The Catholic Encyclopedia vol. 1, 1907. Chapman, John. "Didache." The Catholic Encyclopedia vol. 4, 1908. Chapman, John. "Tertullian." The Catholic Encyclopedia vol. 14, 1912.