Isaiah 58:3-7

Wherefore have we fasted?

Fasts

Fasts were a common feature of the old Israelitish religion (1Ki 21:9; 1 Kings 21:12; Jeremiah 36:9). In Zechariah 8:19 we learn expressly that during the exile four days were observed annually as fasts, in commemoration of dates connected with the fall of Jerusalem. (Prof. S. R. Driver, D. D.)

Fasting

I. CONSIDER IN GENERAL THE DUTY OF FASTING, ITS NATURE, ENDS AND USES. As to the meaning of the word, fasting is only an abstinence from food. Whether this abstinence should be total or partial, and how long it should be continued, cannot be determined by any general rule that can reach all persons; but the constitutions and strength of particular persons must be considered, and such abstinence used by them respectively as will best answer in each the ends and uses of fasting. We are not to look upon fasting in itself as a thing that recommends us to God. But there are good ends for which fasting is appointed, and which are promoted by it, that make it acceptable to God regard, therefore, must ever be had to those ends, and such measures taken as may be most conducive to them, and they are chiefly these--

1. For subduing and mortifying the sinful appetites of the body.

2. For the better disposing the mind to prayer and other spiritual exercises. The corruptible body is too apt to press down the immortal soul.

3. For the testifying our shame and sorrow; our anger at ourselves for our sins. We have God’s express command for it to His people the Jews. The prophet Joel frequently and earnestly presses them to this duty. Holy men of old practised it, as we find in the instances of Ezra, David, Daniel, etc. And that we may not think this to be such a Jewish rite, as concerned only those that lived under their dispensation, we read that when the prophet Jonah denounced God’s judgment against Nineveh, those Gentiles proclaimed a fast, and observed it universally from the greatest to the least. And to put this matter out of all doubt, the blessed Author of our holy roll,on, in His Sermon on the Mount, though He does not directly command fasting yet supposes it a duty to be practised by Christians, gives directions for the right performance of it, and upon such a performance assures us of a blessing from our Father in heaven.

II. REFLECT UPON THOSE FAULTS OF THE JEWS RECORDED IN MY TEXT, WHICH MADE THEIR FASTS UNACCEPTABLE TO GOD.

1. Though they used great outward austerity, and severe discipline towards the body, there was no inward change.

2. Their divisions and contentions. “Ye fast for strife and debate,” etc.

3. Their want of compassion and charity to those that were in affliction (verse 7). A like thread of hypocrisy ran through their fasts, and prayers, and alms, and all their services in our Saviour’s time.

III. INQUIRE WHETHER WE OF THIS NATION ARE NOT JUSTLY CHARGEABLE WITH THE SAME SINS WHICH THEY COMMITTED, and so severely smarted for; and whether we have not too much reason to fear that God may expostulate with us about our public fasts, as He did with them, “ Are they such fasts as I have chosen?”

IV. PRESS YOU TO THE PRACTICE OF SUCH THINGS AS MAY MAKE THIS DAY OF HUMILIATION AN ACCEPTABLE DAY UNTO THE LORD. And what can do this but our careful avoiding those sins which the Jews are here reproved for, and practising their contrary duties?

1. We must be sure to avoid that foolish and provoking sin of hypocrisy.

2. Also all strife and division. S. Let us take heed of unmercifulness and hard-heartedness to those that are in want and misery; for, with what face can we ask, with what reason can we expect from God, supplies for our wants, or succour in our distress, if we refuse such help as we can give to our poor brethren in their affliction? (Bp. Talbot.)

Incipient Pharisaism

There is an incipient Pharisaism in their evident expectation that by external works of righteousness they would hasten the coming of the Messianic salvation. (Prof. J. Skinner, D. D.)

Ye fast for strife

J. D. Michaelis tells a story of a lady who was never known to scold her servants so severely as on fast days, which he says agrees well with physiological principles and facts! (J. A. Alexander.)