Against Jovinianus

They despised angels' food, and sighed for the flesh of Egypt. Moses for forty days and forty nights fasted on Mount Sinai, and showed even then that man does not live on bread alone, but on every word of God. He says to the Lord, “the people is full and makes idols.” Moses with empty stomach received the law written with the finger of God. The people that ate and drank and rose up to play fashioned a golden calf, and preferred an Egyptian ox to the majesty of the Lord. The toil of so many days perished through the fullness of a single hour. Moses boldly broke the tables: for he knew that drunkards cannot hear the word of God. “The beloved grew thick, waxed fat, and became sleek: he kicked and forsook the Lord which made him, and departed from the God of his salvation.” Hence also it is enjoined in the same Book of Deuteronomy: “Beware, lest when you have eaten and drunk, and hast built goodly houses, and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and gold is multiplied, then your heart be lifted up, and thou forget the Lord your God.” In short the people ate and their heart grew thick, lest they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart: so the people well fed and fat-fleshed could not bear the countenance of Moses who fasted, for, to correctly render the Hebrew, it was furnished with horns through his converse with God. And it was not, as some think, to show that there is no difference between virginity and marriage, but to assert his sympathy with severe fasting, that our Lord and Saviour when he was transfigured on the Mount revealed Moses and Elias with Himself in glory. Although Moses and Elias were properly types of the Law and the Prophets, as is clearly witnessed by the Gospel: “They spoke of his departure which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.” For the passion of our Lord is declared not by virginity or marriage, but by the Law and the Prophets. If, however, any persons contentiously maintain that by Moses is signified marriage, by Elias virginity, let me tell them briefly that Moses died and was buried, but Elias was carried off in a chariot of fire and entered on immortality before he approached death. But the second writing of the tables could not be effected without fasting. What was lost by drunkenness was regained by abstinence, a proof that by fasting we can return to paradise, whence, though fullness, we have been expelled. In Exodus we read that the battle was fought against Amalek while Moses prayed, and the whole people fasted until the evening. Joshua, the son of Nun, bade sun and moon stand still, and the victorious army prolonged its fast for more than a day. Saul, as it is written in the first book of Kings, pronounced a curse on him who ate bread before the evening, and until he had avenged himself upon his enemies. So none of his people tasted any food. And all they of the land took food. And so binding was a solemn fast once it was proclaimed to the Lord, that Jonathan, to whom the victory was due, was taken by lot, and could not escape the charge of sinning in ignorance, and his father's hand was raised against him, and the prayers of the people scarce availed to save him. Elijah after the preparation of a forty days fast saw God on Mount Horeb, and heard from Him the words, “What doest thou here, Elijah?” There is much more familiarity in this than in the “Where are you, Adam?” of Genesis. The latter was intended to excite the fears of one who had fed and was lost; the former was affectionately addressed to a fasting servant. When the people were assembled in Mizpeh, Samuel proclaimed a fast, and so strengthened them, and thus made them prevail against the enemy. The attack of the Assyrians was repulsed, and the might of Sennacherib utterly crushed, by the tears and sackcloth of King Hezekiah, and by his humbling himself with fasting. So also the city of Nineveh by fasting excited compassion and turned aside the threatening wrath of the Lord. And Sodom and Gomorrha might have appeased it, had they been willing to repent, and through the aid of fasting gain for themselves tears of repentance. Ahab, the most impious of kings, by fasting and wearing sackcloth, succeeded in escaping the sentence of God, and in deferring the overthrow of his house to the days of his posterity. Hannah, the wife of Elkanah, by fasting won the gift of a son. At Babylon the magicians came into peril, every interpreter of dreams, soothsayer, and diviner was slain. Daniel and the three youths gained a good report by fasting, and although they were fed on pulse, they were fairer and wiser than they who ate the flesh from the king's table. Then it is written that Daniel fasted for three weeks; he ate no pleasant bread; flesh and wine entered not his mouth; he was not anointed with oil; and the angel came to him saying, “Daniel, you are worthy of compassion.” He who in the eyes of God was worthy of compassion, afterwards was an object of terror to the lions in their den. How fair a thing is that which propitiates God, tames lions, terrifies demons! Habakkuk (although we do not find this in the Hebrew Scriptures) was sent to him with the reaper's meal, for by a week's abstinence he had merited so distinguished a server. David, when his son was in danger after his adultery, made confession in ashes and with fasting. He tells us that he ate ashes like bread, and mingled his drink with weeping. And that his knees became weak through fasting. Yet he had certainly heard from Nathan the words, “The Lord also has put away your sin.” Samson and Samuel drank neither wine nor strong drink, for they were children of promise, and conceived in abstinence and fasting. Aaron and the other priests when about to enter the temple, refrained from all intoxicating drink for fear they should die. Whence we learn that they die who minister in the Church without sobriety. And hence it is a reproach against Israel: “You gave my Nazarites wine to drink.” Jonadab, the son of Rechab, commanded his sons to drink no wine for ever. And when Jeremiah offered them wine to drink, and they of their own accord refused it, the Lord spoke by the prophet, saying: “Because you have obeyed the commandment of Jonadab your father, Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand before me for ever.” On the threshold of the Gospel appears Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, the wife of one husband, and a woman who was always fasting. Long-continued chastity and persistent fasting welcomed a Virgin Lord. His forerunner and herald, John, fed on locusts and wild honey, not on flesh; and the hermits of the desert and the monks in their cells, at first used the same sustenance. But the Lord Himself consecrated His baptism by a forty days' fast, and He taught us that the more violent devils cannot be overcome, except by prayer and fasting. Cornelius the centurion was found worthy through almsgiving and frequent fasts to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit before baptism. The Apostle Paul, after speaking of hunger and thirst, and his other labours, perils from robbers, shipwrecks, loneliness, enumerates frequent fasts. And he advises his disciple Timothy, who had a weak stomach, and was subject to many infirmities, to drink wine in moderation: “Drink no longer water,” he says. The fact that he bids him no longer drink water shows that he had previously drunk water. The apostle would not have allowed this had not frequent infirmities and bodily pain demanded the concession.