What does Scripture say about fasting?

¹⁶ “Moreover when you fast, don’t be like the hypocrites, with sad faces. For they disfigure their faces that they may be seen by men to be fasting. Most certainly I tell you, they have received their reward. ¹⁷ But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, ¹⁸ so that you are not seen by men to be fasting, but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.

¹⁴ Then John’s disciples came to him, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples don’t fast?” ¹⁵ Jesus said to them, “Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.

¹⁸ John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting, and they came and asked him, “Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples don’t fast?” ¹⁹ Jesus said to them, “Can the groomsmen fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they can’t fast. ²⁰ But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day.

¹ Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. ² When he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was hungry afterward. ³ The tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” ⁴ But he answered, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of God’s mouth.’”

²⁸ And Moses was there before the Lord forty days, and forty nights; he did not eat bread, and he did not drink water; and he wrote upon the tables these words of the covenant, the ten sayings.

⁸ And he arose, and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights to mount Choreb.

¹² Now therefore, saith the Lord your God, turn to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with lamentation: ¹³ and rend your hearts, and not your garments, and turn to the Lord your God: for he is merciful and compassionate, long-suffering, and plenteous in mercy, and repents of evils.

⁵ And the men of Nineve believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloths, from the greatest of them to the least of them. ⁶ And the word reached the king of Nineve, and he arose from off his throne, and took off his raiment from him, and put on sackcloth, and sat on ashes. ⁷ And proclamation was made, and it was commanded in Nineve by the king and by his great men, saying, Let not men, or cattle, or oxen, or sheep, taste [any thing], nor feed, nor drink water. ⁸ So men and cattle were clothed with sackcloths, and cried earnestly to God; and they turned every one from their evil way, and from the iniquity that was in their hands, saying, ⁹ Who knows if God will repent, and turn from his fierce anger, and [so] we shall not perish? ¹⁰ And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil ways; and God repented of the evil which he had said he would do to them; and he did [it] not.

³ I set my face to the Lord God, to seek by prayer and petitions, with fasting and sackcloth and ashes.

¹ Now on the twenty-fourth day of this month the children of Israel assembled with fasting, and in sackcloths, and with ashes on their head. ² And the children of Israel separated themselves from every stranger, and stood and confessed their sins, and the iniquities of their fathers. ³ And they stood in their place, and read in the book of the law of the Lord their God: and they confessed [their sins] to the Lord, and worshipped the Lord their God.

²⁹ He said to them, “This kind can come out by nothing but by prayer and fasting.”

² As they served the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, “Separate Barnabas and Saul for me, for the work to which I have called them.” ³ Then, when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them, they sent them away.

²³ When they had appointed elders for them in every assembly, and had prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord on whom they had believed.

³⁶ There was one Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher (she was of a great age, having lived with a husband seven years from her virginity, ³⁷ and she had been a widow for about eighty-four years), who didn’t depart from the temple, worshiping with fastings and petitions night and day.

⁵ Don’t deprive one another, unless it is by consent for a season, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer, and may be together again, that Satan doesn’t tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

³ saying, Why have we fasted, and thou regardest not? [why] have we afflicted our souls, and thou didst not know it? Nay, in the days of your fasts ye find your pleasures, and all them that are under your power ye wound. ⁴ If ye fast for quarrels and strifes, and smite the lowly with [your] fists, wherefore do ye fast to me as [ye do] this day, so that your voice may be heard in crying? ⁵ I have not chosen this fast, nor [such] a day for a man to afflict his soul; neither though thou shouldest bend down thy neck as a ring, and spread under thee sackcloth and ashes, neither thus shall ye call a fast acceptable. ⁶ I have not chosen such a fast, saith the Lord; but do thou loose every burden of iniquity, do thou untie the knots of hard bargains, set the bruised free, and cancel every unjust account. ⁷ Break thy bread to the hungry, and lead the unsheltered poor to thy house: if thou seest one naked, clothe [him], and thou shalt not disregard the relations of thine own seed.

⁹ He also spoke this parable to certain people who were convinced of their own righteousness, and who despised all others: ¹⁰ “Two men went up into the temple to pray; one was a Pharisee, and the other was a tax collector. ¹¹ The Pharisee stood and prayed by himself like this: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of men: extortionists, unrighteous, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. ¹² I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get.’ ¹³ But the tax collector, standing far away, wouldn’t even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his chest, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ ¹⁴ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

¹ Now accept one who is weak in faith, but not for disputes over opinions. ² One man has faith to eat all things, but he who is weak eats only vegetables. ³ Don’t let him who eats despise him who doesn’t eat. Don’t let him who doesn’t eat judge him who eats, for God has accepted him. ⁴ Who are you who judge another’s servant? To his own lord he stands or falls. Yes, he will be made to stand, for God has power to make him stand. ⁵ One man esteems one day as more important. Another esteems every day alike. Let each man be fully assured in his own mind. ⁶ He who observes the day, observes it to the Lord; and he who does not observe the day, to the Lord he does not observe it. He who eats, eats to the Lord, for he gives God thanks. He who doesn’t eat, to the Lord he doesn’t eat, and gives God thanks.

¹⁶ Let no one therefore judge you in eating or drinking, or with respect to a feast day or a new moon or a Sabbath day, ¹⁷ which are a shadow of the things to come; but the body is Christ’s. ¹⁸ Let no one rob you of your prize by self-abasement and worshiping of the angels, dwelling in the things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, ¹⁹ and not holding firmly to the Head, from whom all the body, being supplied and knit together through the joints and ligaments, grows with God’s growth. ²⁰ If you died with Christ from the elemental spirits of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to ordinances, ²¹ “Don’t handle, nor taste, nor touch” ²² (all of which perish with use), according to the precepts and doctrines of men? ²³ These things indeed appear like wisdom in self-imposed worship, humility, and severity to the body, but aren’t of any value against the indulgence of the flesh.

¹ But the Spirit says expressly that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons, ² through the hypocrisy of men who speak lies, branded in their own conscience as with a hot iron, ³ forbidding marriage and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. ⁴ For every creature of God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving. ⁵ For it is sanctified through the word of God and prayer.