The Nineteen-Day Fast

The story behind the day

The Nineteen-Day Fast is the annual Bahá'í fast. It is kept in ʿAláʾ, the nineteenth and last month of the Badíʿ year, which usually runs from 2 to 20 March, and on each of the nineteen days adult believers take no food or drink in the hours of daylight, from sunrise until sunset. The fast ends with Naw-Rúz, the New Year. Bahá'u'lláh ordained it in his book of laws, and Bahá'ís understand it above all as a time of prayer, meditation and spiritual renewal.^[1–6]

Origins

Bahá'u'lláh set out the Fast in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, his book of laws, which one scholarly encyclopedia dates to 1873, when he was a prisoner in Acre. He placed it in the last month of the calendar that the Báb had introduced, directly after the intercalary days of Ayyám-i-Há. The law binds believers from the age of maturity, fixed at fifteen, until the age of seventy, when the obligation ends. The Fast is therefore a matter of Bahá'í law and not only of custom.^[6–9]

What it marks

The Fast is not tied to a historical event; its meaning is inward. Bahá'u'lláh paired it with obligatory prayer among the duties of believers, and a reference work lists fasting, with daily prayer, pilgrimage and a tithe, among the obligations he laid down. Reference works describe its purpose as detaching the believer from the material world and turning attention to the spiritual life. ʿAbdu'l-Bahá called the physical fast an outer token of a spiritual one, a symbol of self-restraint, and taught that it leads to a cleansing of the soul from selfish desires.^{[5, 10–12]}

How it came to be

In the Badíʿ year the Fast sits between two other seasons: the festive intercalary days of Ayyám-i-Há come first, and Naw-Rúz follows. Because the Badíʿ year is solar, the Fast falls at the same season each year, just before the spring equinox, and it is usually given as 2 to 20 March. In 2014 the Universal House of Justice ruled that the first day of the fasting month varies with the day on which the coming Naw-Rúz falls. The monthly gathering that begins each Bahá'í month, the Nineteen Day Feast, is a separate observance and should not be confused with the Fast.^{[2, 4, 8, 13–14]}

How it is kept

dawn breakfast before sunrise — Dawn breakfast before sunriseIllustration · AI-generated

Adult believers take neither food nor drink between sunrise and sunset on each of the nineteen days. The obligation applies from the age of fifteen, and it does not bind travellers, the ill, or women who are pregnant or nursing. Reference works also list children under fifteen, people over seventy and those doing heavy labour among the exempt. Those who cannot keep the physical fast can still keep it spiritually, through prayer and detachment, so that no one is excluded from the season's purpose.^{[3, 9, 15–17]}

Sources

Each statement above was checked against published sources; the verdict says whether it stood as written, was corrected or was hedged.