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FASTING QUOTES

FASTING QUOTES

taken from Orthodox Prayer Life by Father Matta el- Miskeen

 

+ The table of a man who continually perseveres in prayer is sweeter than the scent of musk and the fragrance of perfumes, and the lover of God yearns for this as for a priceless treasure.

Take for yourself the remedy of life from the table of those who fast, keep vigil, and labour in the Lord, and so raise up the dead man in your soul. For the Beloved reclines in their midst bestowing sanctification and he transforms the bitterness of their hardship into his ineffable sweetness. His spiritual and heavenly ministers overshadow both them and their holy foods. I know one of the brethren who has seen this with his own eyes.

(St Isaac the Syrian, Homilies 15, in The Ascetical Homilies of Saint Isaac the Syrian, p 88)

 

+ There can be no knowledge of the mysteries of God on a full stomach.

(St Isaac the Syrian, Homilies 4, in Ascetical Homilies, p 33)

 

+ Fasting, vigil . . . . are God’s holy pathway and the foundation of every virtue.

(St Isaac the Syrian, Homilies 37, in Ascetical Homilies, p 171)

 

+  Fasting is the champion of every virtue, the beginning of the struggle, the crown of the abstinent, the beauty of virginity and sanctity, the resplendence of chastity, the commencement of the path of Christianity, the mother of prayer, the well-spring of sobriety and prudence, the teacher of stillness, and the precursor of all good works.

(St Isaac the Syrian, Homilies 37, in Ascetical Homilies, p 171)

 

+ When a man begins to fast, he straightway yearns in his mind to enter into converse with God.

(St Isaac the Syrian, Homilies 37, in Ascetical Homilies, p 171)

 

+ Fasting was the commandment that was given to our nature in the beginning to protect it with respect to the tasting of food, and in this point the progenitor of our substance fell. There, however, where the first defeat was suffered, the ascetic strugglers make their beginning in the fear of God as they start to keep his laws.

And the Saviour also, when he manifested himself to the world in the Jordan, began at this point. For after his baptism the Spirit led him into the wilderness and he fasted for forty days and forty nights. Likewise all who set to follow in his footsteps make the beginning of their struggle upon this foundation. For this is a weapon forged by God, and who shall escape blame if he neglects it? And if the Lawgiver himself fast, who among those who keep the law has no need of fasting?

(St Isaac the Syrian, Homilies 37, in Ascetical Homilies, p 172)

 

+ What weapon is more powerful and gives more boldness to the heart in the time of battle against the spirits of wickedness, than hunger endured for Christ’s sake? . .. . . He who has armed himself with the weapon of fasting is afire with zeal at all times.

(St Isaac the Syrian, Homilies 37, in Ascetical Homilies, p 172)

 

+ It is said concerning many of the martyrs, that when they foreknew, either by revelation or by information received from one of their friends, the day on which they were to receive the crown of martyrdom, they did not taste anything the preceding night, but from evening till morning they stood keeping vigil in prayer, glorifying God in psalms, hymns, and spiritual odes, and they looked forward to that hour with joy and exultation, waiting to meet the sword in their fast as ones prepared for the nuptials.

(St Isaac the Syrian, Homilies 37, in Ascetical Homilies, pp 172, 173)

 

+ Therefore let us also be vigilant, we who are called to an unseen martyrdom so as to receive the crowns of sanctification.

 (St Isaac the Syrian, Homilies 37, in Ascetical Homilies, p 173)

 

+ When you sit at a well-laden table, remember death and remember death and remember judgment, and even then you will only manage to restrain yourself a little.

(St John Climacus, The Ladder of Divine Ascent 14.34, p 169)

 

+ And when you drink, keep always in mind the vinegar and gall of your Lord. Then indeed you will either be temperate or sighing.

(St John Climacus, The Ladder of Divine Ascent 14.34, p 169)

 

+ And so for nearly twenty years he continued training himself in solitude, never going forth, and seen but seldom by any. After this, when many were eager and wishful to imitate his discipline, and his acquaintances came and began to cast down and wrench off the door by force, Antony, as from a shrine, came forth initiated in the mysteries and filled with the Spirit of God. Then for the first time he was seen outside the fort by those who came to see him. And they, then they saw him, wondered at the sight, for he had the same habit of body as before, and was neither fat, like a man without exercise, nor lean from fasting and striving with the demons, but he was just the same as they had known him before his retirement.

(St Athanasius, Life of Antony 14, NPNF, 2nd series, 4.200)

Copyright 2011 by Saint Mary & Anba Bishoy Coptic Orthodox Church