Comments on: Starving for God: Foodless Dieting For the Soul

By: hotwheels65

hotwheels65 — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 02:54:59 +0000

I found interesting the 40 day Ramadan fast in Islam is only during the daylight hours and must be broken at sundown. Then they are free to eat and drink as much as they want till dawn. And there is the option to feed the poor instead of fasting. Ironically, more food ends up consumed during the fasting than any other time of year.

By: Sherry Morton

Sherry Morton — Thu, 16 Jun 2011 21:19:48 +0000

Asking why religious traditions are focused on the body and what it consumes is a facinating question. Given the wide range of fasting techniques (absolutely no food, limited tea or buttermilk, nothing other than fruit or vegitable juice) it seems that defining fasting is as problematic as defining religion.

I agree that reducing the long tradition of fasting to an eating disorder or an absence of rationality takes the richness out of the conversation. What might be more interesting is to compare why different traditions engage in fasting; what is the pay off for this practice? Evolutionary anthropologist such as Steven Mithen point out that almost any practice that survives over time is one that promotes the survival or propigation of the species. On the surface fasting seems to do neither. So why is fasting found in so many religious traditions?
Regardless of the answers I agree the reltionship of religion to religious bodies is fascinating if not at times bizarre.

By: Hannah Spadafora

Hannah Spadafora — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 16:58:30 +0000

If you haven’t already read such, “Holy Feast and Holy Fast” is a fascinating book on similar subject, though its focus is more on historical women’s relationships with spirituality and food.

By: v-money with special sauce

v-money with special sauce — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 16:18:38 +0000

I wouldn’t cite the James Randi foundation when critiquing a group for being unscientific. Their non-empirical methods are far removed from legitimate and sound scientific methodology.

By: Joy

Joy — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 11:59:02 +0000

Very interesting. I’d be cautious about those last three sentences though. Is it the place of a religious studies academic to judge those who they are studying? Or to observe, and try to come to a deeper understanding about their subject matter? Instead of condemning scientists in India, it would be more interesting to know why it holds such an appeal to the adherents. Why is fasting so popular, and why are the more radical adherents willingly starving themselves? I’m not talking on the theological level, which you address, but on the individual. What, according to their belief systems, do they gain by going without physical food? Chalking it up to ‘eating disorder’ doesn’t really tell us much.