'The Tablet 20 October 2007

Review on Dag Tessores book Fasting

(New it!" #$" 2007%
b! hristo&her 'owse" assistant e(itor o) The Dail! Telegra&h*
+bstinence in the age o) the eating (isor(er
In a fast of, say, five days, "normally after a day or two the stomach cramps
cease, as does the feeling of hunger", yet it remains "tiring and difficult: every
hour that passes without eating is an interior battle". That is the experience of
Dag Tessore, no desert stylite, but a married man and father, who is convinced of
the physical and spiritual benefits of a total and prolonged fast.
The important intention of his little book, however, is to reintroduce the idea of
ascetical fasting on a more modest and regular scale. It has, he argues through a
wide survey of patristic sources, dwindled unnecessarily in the estern !atholic
!hurch, although the "astern !hurches have in theory retained the ancient
discipline.
The author is wary of the twin dangers of formalism. # fast can be without virtue.
"$ou fast," says %t &erome, "but perhaps you lose your temper' another person
eats, but
is perhaps kind and gentle." (n the other hand, the obligation to fast can be
circumvented by canonical shifts. )oor )ope *enedict +I, complained in the
-./0s that "the most sacred observance of the 1enten fast, through the
excessive and indiscriminate granting of dispensations everywhere, for futile and
not urgent reasons, has been almost entirely eliminated."
If, though, we have left off other customs of life from the times of the !hurch
2athers, why bother to fast3 2asting is a natural expression of mourning, Tessore
argues, and so, like 4oses in Deuteronomy 56:-78, if we see 9od offended,
fasting is a proper response.
*eyond that, as %t #mbrose asserted, fasting shows humilitas mentis, a
lowliness of mind, which Tessore explains by the "feeling of hunger, suffering and
tiredness" being "translated automatically on the psychological level, into an
attitude of humility and sincere repentance".
%t *asil said that repentance without fasting was useless. It is an earnest of
repentance, like any other penance. %t #mbrose characterised it as a "sacrifice of
reconciliation" with 9od. "ven in the (ld Testament, the notion of fasting for the
benefit of someone else was recognised. "sther asks the &ews in exile to "hold a
fast on my behalf".
That is not to e:uate fasting with self;punishment, nor food with evil. !hristians
were never 4anichees, and always blessed their food before they ate it. In an
introduction to the book, !anon <icholas %agovsky of estminster #bbey opines
that "some of what it claims about the benefits of fasting is open to :uestion 5and,
with the prevalence in estern cultures of eating; disorders, it is especially
important to fast wisely8."
*ut it could be argued 5not that Dag Tessore gets into this complication8 that
fasting, in a tradition, militates against eating disorders. I don=t mean heroic fasts,
but limited fasts formerly en>oined by the !hurch. 2irst, they were communitarian,
so that meatless 2ridays were an identifying and uniting badge. %econdly, they
undermined individual food fads. hen, in the "astern tradition, six foods were
eschewed in 1ent 5meat, fish, dairy products, eggs, wine and oil8, this made them
desirable at other times.
*ut it is useless to over;rationalise cultural practices. !arthusians are vegetarian,
but we know that &esus was not. ?e shared the paschal lamb like any good &ew,
and with great significance. It is notable that &esus= fast for /0 days matched that
of the forerunners who >oined him on the mountain of the Transfiguration: 4oses
and "li>ah. #s for what he taught about fasting, it is on the interior rather than the
formal level: "ash your face, so that your fasting may be seen not by others but
by your 2ather who is in secret."
*ut &esus did not tell us not to fast. 2asting was part of the liturgical pattern from
the earliest times. The Didache, one of the earliest !hristian documents outside
the <ew Testament, en>oined a fast on ednesdays and 2ridays. Details differed
between "ast and est, and Irenaeus in the second century, and later #mbrose
in the fourth, wisely counselled observance of the local custom.
In passing, there is a crux on one page where reference is made to a thirteenth;
century fast;day habit "of eating granite and other similar foods". # footnote
renders this as "a grain;textured, flavoured water;ice". It is a charming idea, but
is not a grainy porridge meant3
%o what is to be done today, when it scarcely occurs to many !atholics to fast,
except to slim or for reasons of health3 Tessore favours a simple diet of natural
foodstuffs, which agrees with current received opinion. *ut he lives in 9reece,
where a local rural diet fits
the bill. In urban *ritain, it can be a greater penance to eat sliced bread, rather
than more expensive, delicious artisanal loaves. In 4exico, the poor do not eat
bread at all, but beans or mai@e tortillas. %o the benefits of fasting must come
from the spirit, not a Tessore diet.
%ince !atholics remain under an obligation to perform some act of penance each
2riday, in memory and solidarity with &esus !hrist and his still suffering 4ystical
*ody, they might visit the sick or prisoners. (r perhaps Tessore is right and a
spot of fasting or abstinence is no bad idea.
hristo&her 'owse
+bstract an( ,n(e- o) the book.
htt&.//(agtessore0english*blogs&ot*co1/&/christian0)asting0citta0n2ova0
ro1e*ht1l
3here to b2! this book.
htt&.//www*cenacle*co*2k/&ro(2cts*as&4&artno567809:*;6gi<=scT,;
The other books o) Dag Tessore. htt&.//(agtessore0english*blogs&ot*co1/