SPIRITUALITY
JUDAISM
On Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, Jews observe a 25-hour fast (ta’anit) lasting from sunset to darkness the following night. The fast is a time for confession and prayer. According to tradition, the first Yom Kippur happened after the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt in the 13th century BCE.
BUDDHISM
According to Buddhist tradition, Siddhartha Gautama (later known as the Buddha), born between 563 BCE and 480 BCE, meditated and fasted to overcome desire and achieve enlightenment. ‘As the story goes, he ate only a grain of rice and a sesame seed per day,’ says Rev Heng Sure, director of the Berkeley Buddhist Monastery in California. ‘He discovered that desire did not end by force, and accepted a meal offered to him by a
