(Aljumuah offers our series of articles by Reform Jewish Rabbi, Allen S. Maller, as a bridge-building effort to promote good relations among Jewish and Muslim communities. We share much in common due to the same source of our prophets and the revelations they received, namely the One God. Indeed, we are both stronger when we work together for justice, peace and mutual understanding. Our profound thanks to Rabbi Allen, who alone is responsible for the views and interpretations expressed herein.)

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TARIQ RAMADAN STATES that: “The philosophy of fasting calls upon us to know ourselves, to master ourselves, and to discipline ourselves; the better to free ourselves. To fast is to identify our dependencies, and free ourselves from them.

The following fable illustrates a way to teach children and grandchildren the value of fasting.

Once, the King of Norway went out to hunt. After a few hours he decided to stop for lunch. His servants unpacked a large picnic basket they had brought with them and set up a table.

Now the king didn’t want to eat together with his servants, nor did he want to eat all by himself. So the king told a servant to find someone to come and eat lunch with his king. The servant went to a nearby road, and saw two 13-year-old boys walking by. The king’s servant told them that the king wanted to see them.

The boys were very surprised, and a little frightened, but they went with the king’s servant. When they arrived at the picnic, the table was set with all kinds of wonderful foods and drinks. The king told the boys to sit down next to him and eat. The boys sat down next to the king, but they did not eat.

After a few minutes the king said, “Why are you not eating? My food is prepared by the best cook in the kingdom. It is the best tasting food in the country. Doesn’t it look good to you”

“It looks great, and I am sure it is the best food I will ever taste,” answered one boy, “but I can’t eat it.”

“Did you just finish eating lunch? If so you do not have to eat a whole meal, just have some of these great deserts” said the king.

The other boy replied, “Actually we did not eat lunch today, but we cannot eat anything, not even one of those really good looking chocolate covered strawberries.”

The king was surprised and asked, “Are you sick? Is that why you have lost your appetite?”

“No,” said the boys, “We are not sick and we haven’t lost our appetites.”

“Then why are you not hungry?” asked the king.

“We are hungry” said one boy, and his friend added, “Neither of us ate lunch, and I did not even eat breakfast. We are very, very hungry.”

The king looked bewildered and shouted, “Then why don’t you eat the food since both of you are hungry and the food is very delicious?”

“Because as a Muslim, I am fasting for the whole month of Ramadan[1] from sunrise to sunset.” said one boy. The other boy nodded and said, “And today is Yom Kippur*[2] and as a Jew I have been fasting since last evening.”

The king was astonished and said, “So what! Why shouldn’t you enjoy yourselves? This is the best tasting food you will ever eat; and you are very hungry.”

“That is true, but that makes it even more important for us to fast,” answered the boys. “It is easy not to eat food you do not like. The test of a person’s self-control is best when the temptation is the greatest.”

“Do you think God cares if you eat or not? Go ahead and eat, I will not tell anyone, especially your parents.”

Both boys replied, “No thanks. Even if you don’t tell anyone else, we will know that we failed to live up to our religious duties to God.”

The king thought for a moment and then asked the Muslim boy why the Muslim God made Muslims fast for a whole month while the Jewish God only required one day of fasting.

The Muslim boy answered,

“There is only one God. Jews and Muslims obey the same God, but God asks each religious community to do different things. Muslims fast in Ramadan because that is the month when Prophet Muhammad received the first verses of the Holy Qur’an.

“Fasting brings us closer to God and stimulates us to give charity to the hungry. Jews fast for one 24 hour day because that is what the Torah requires of them. God judges us according to how good we are in our own religion, not according to somebody else’s religion.

“The Holy Qur’an says, ‘If Allah had so willed, He could have made humans a single people, but He tests you in what He has revealed to you, so strive to compete in all virtues.’ My father says that this is one of the most important teachings of the Qur’an for both Muslims and everyone else in today’s world.

“Muslims fast everyday for the whole month of Ramadan, but only from sunrise to sunset. We can eat dinner after sunset and breakfast before sunrise. Jews have to go without food or drink for a full 24 hours on Yom Kippur. Each community must be faithful to its own religion.”

The king asked the Jewish boy, “What is Yom Kippur?”

“Yom Kippur is a day of atonement that teaches us that we must improve ourselves each year by changing some of our bad habits or behavior. We must admit we have done bad things and hurt people. We have to go face the people we hurt and make peace with them. This is not easy to do. My father says that to improve oneself takes lots of self-discipline.

“Fasting is good training in one of the most basic and difficult self-disciplines: diet. It is easy to eat food that tastes good. But to limit yourself by restricting your diet every day, and not eating at all on Yom Kippur, is a real challenge and helps Jews improve their self-control and spiritual self-discipline.

“All faithful Jews who are 13 years or older, are commanded by God to fast on Yom Kippur, so I have not eaten since dinner last night. I knew fasting 24 hours on Yom Kippur would be a test of my will power, and my commitment to be a faithful Jew, but I never thought I’d be challenged by being tempted to eat a meal fit for a king.”

The king was very impressed by what the boys said. He was even more impressed by the boys’ self-discipline and commitment to be faithful to their own religious teachings. So the king told the boys to come to the palace the next evening, along with their entire family, and have dinner with the king and the queen. And that is what they did.

The next year, the king also tried to fast on Yom Kippur, but he was only able to fast until 4 pm when he gave up, saying “I couldn’t do it for even one 24 hour day.  I guess if you don’t start when you are young it is a lot harder than it sounds.”

Rabbi Maller’s web site is: www.rabbimaller.com.  Rabbi Maller’s book Judaism and Islam as Synergistic Monotheisms: One Rabbi’s Reflections on the Profound Connectedness between Islam and Judaismcontains 31 articles by Rabbi Maller first published by Islamic web sites andis for sale ($15) on Amazon and Morebooks.

[1] Both the Jewish and the Muslim calendars are based on the moon (lunar calendar); so the dates of Muslim and Jewish holidays change each year in terms of the solar (sun) calendar. The Jewish calendar is connected to the solar calendar such that the changes are not cumulative. The Muslim calendar’s changes are cumulative in that  Ramadan falls 11 days earlier every year. In every generation Yom Kippur and Ramadan coincide at least 2 or 3 times. Most recently, 2005, 2006 and 2007 were three years in a row that Yom Kippur coincided with Ramadan.

[2]  Yom Kippur: the Day of Atonement (at-one-ment) is the last day of the ten Days of Awe, when Jews examine their hearts and minds to seek out people they think they have hurt or ignored during the last year to make amends and reconcile. God will forgive their sins when they have both reconciled with others, and reformed themselves so as not to repeat their own bad behavior.