FASTING

It is quite possible for Zen to be adapted and used to clear the air of ascetic irrelevancies and help us to regain a healthy natural balance in our understanding of the spiritual life.

(ZBA 58)

Fasting remained primarily an act of worship and an act of witness to universal truth. It formed part of the Hindu dharma and therefore of India’s witness to the religious truths implicit in the very structure of cosmic reality.

(GNV 14)

Fasting cannot be undertaken mechanically. It is a powerful thing but a dangerous thing if handled amateurishly. It requires complete self-purification much more than is required in facing death with retaliation in mind.

(II-165, GNV 89)

There is not room for imitation in fasts. He who has no inner strength should not dream of it, and never with attachment to success. But if a satyagrahi once undertakes a fast from conviction, he must stick to his resolve whether there is a change of his action bearing fruit or not. . . . He who fasts in expectation of fruit generally fails.

(II-48, GNV 87)

“Tell me,” said Yen Hui, “what is fasting of the heart?”

Confucius replied: “The goal of fasting is inner unity. . . . Fasting of the heart empties the faculties, frees you from limitation and from preoccupation. Fasting of the heart begets unity and freedom.”

(WCZ 52–3)

Look at this window: it is nothing but a hole in the wall, but because of it the whole room is full of light. So when the faculties are empty, the heart is full of light. Being full of light it becomes an influence by which others are secretly transformed.

(iv.I, WCZ 53)