# How Long Did Jesus Fast? How Many Days Did Jesus Fast? 40, the One Fast the Gospels Record Source: https://christianpure.com/learn/jesus-fasting-habits/ Publisher: Christian Pure (https://christianpure.com/) Published: 2024-05-24 Updated: 2026-10-20 Jesus fasted for forty days, alone in the wilderness after his baptism, and it is the only fast of his that the Gospels record. Luke says that "in those days he did eat nothing: and when they were ended, he afterward hungered" (Luke 4:2). None of the Gospels says whether he drank water. Matthew, Mark and Luke all tell of the forty days, and John's Gospel does not. Matthew counts them as "forty days and forty nights", the same words Exodus uses for Moses on the mountain. Then comes the hunger, and with it the first temptation: turn these stones into bread. Jesus answers with a line we still live on: "Man shall not live by bread alone" (Matthew 4:4). The whole fast turns on that bread. ## How many days did Jesus fast, and how long did he go without food? Forty days. Matthew writes: "Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred" (Matthew 4:1–2). Luke gives the same span and is the plainest about food: "in those days he did eat nothing" (Luke 4:2). Mark, the shortest of the three, gives the forty days without using the word fast: "And he was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted of Satan; and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered unto him" (Mark 1:13). Put the three side by side and you see a man who went without food for forty days, felt the hunger when the days were over, and was then tempted to turn stones into bread. The Catechism of the Catholic Church sums up the same texts: "Driven by the Spirit into the desert, Jesus remains there for forty days without eating; he lives among wild beasts, and angels minister to him." Leo the Great, bishop of Rome in the fifth century, saw something in the hunger itself. After the forty days, he preached, Jesus "had experienced the hunger of human weakness". The one who was true God showed that he was truly human too. He was hungry as we are hungry. There is no hint of food during the forty days, and nothing like Daniel's three weeks of partial fasting, when "I ate no pleasant bread, neither came flesh nor wine in my mouth" (Daniel 10:3). Luke's "he did eat nothing" is all the Gospels tell us. ## How many times did Jesus fast in the Bible? Once, as far as the Gospels record. The forty days in the wilderness are the only fast of his they describe. He very likely also kept the yearly fast the Law of Moses set for Israel, the Day of Atonement, though no Gospel mentions it. Leviticus commands that "in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, ye shall afflict your souls" (Leviticus 16:29), and in Acts the day is simply "the fast" (Acts 27:9). The Mishnah, the code of Jewish law written down around AD 200, rules that on Yom Kippur it is "prohibited to engage in eating and in drinking". We see Jesus going up to Jerusalem for the feasts (Luke 2:41–42; John 7:10), so he would very likely have kept this day too. That is a fair guess from what we know of him, and it stays a guess. You may read that Jesus fasted before choosing the twelve apostles. Luke tells us that "he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God" (Luke 6:12), and in the morning he chose the Twelve. It was a night of prayer, and the verse says nothing about fasting. His other recorded times of prayer are gathered in [how many times Jesus prayed in the Bible](https://christianpure.com/learn/jesus-prayer-habits-frequency/). What the Gospels do show is that Jesus and his disciples stood out for not fasting. Some devout Jews fasted often; the Pharisee in Jesus' parable boasts, "I fast twice in the week" (Luke 18:12). So people asked him, "Why do the disciples of John and of the Pharisees fast, but thy disciples fast not?" (Mark 2:18). He set himself beside John the Baptist and let the critics hear how they sounded: "For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, He hath a devil. The Son of man came eating and drinking, and they say, Behold a man gluttonous, and a winebibber" (Matthew 11:18–19). ## Did Jesus drink water while he fasted? The Gospels do not say. Luke says he ate nothing, and Matthew says that afterwards he was hungry; neither mentions water or thirst. Anyone who answers yes or no is reasoning beyond the text. The silence stands out, because the Old Testament speaks plainly when a fast went without water. Of Moses on Sinai, Exodus says, "he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water" (Exodus 34:28), and Deuteronomy says it of two such stays (Deuteronomy 9:9 and 9:18). Elijah's forty days were different again: he "did eat and drink, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God" (1 Kings 19:8). Esther asked the Jews of Shushan to fast with her for three days and "neither eat nor drink" (Esther 4:16). | Who | How long | Food and water, as the text says | | --- | --- | --- | | Moses on Sinai (Exodus 34:28; Deuteronomy 9:9, 9:18) | 40 days and nights, twice | No bread, no water | | Elijah on the way to Horeb (1 Kings 19:8) | 40 days and nights | Ate and drank, then walked on without food | | Jesus in the wilderness (Matthew 4:2; Luke 4:2) | 40 days (Matthew: and nights) | Ate nothing; water not mentioned | | Esther and the Jews of Shushan (Esther 4:16) | 3 days | No food, no drink | Scripture gives no month for Jesus' forty days, so we do not know the season either, or how hot the wilderness was. ## Is it safe to copy Jesus' forty-day fast? No. Going without water for more than a short time is dangerous, and going forty days without food is dangerous too. The NHS warns that dehydration, if untreated, "can get worse and become a serious problem", and it lists confusion, difficulty breathing and cold, blotchy skin as signs of shock that need emergency care. A dietitian at the Cleveland Clinic advises against dry fasting altogether: "The risk of dry fasting is not worth the benefits." Even fasts much shorter than forty days strain the body. In a University of Sydney study published in 2025, volunteers who drank only water for ten days reported headaches, insomnia and low blood pressure, and the researchers found that "prolonged fasting put stress on the body". They urge people "to seek medical advice before attempting" such fasts. If you are planning a long fast, talk to a doctor first, above all if you are pregnant or nursing, have diabetes, or have had an eating disorder. The Cleveland Clinic counts people who are pregnant or nursing among those for whom even intermittent fasting, skipping meals for part of the day, is not safe. It tells people with diabetes to "talk with your diabetes management team" before a religious fast, and warns that anyone with a history of an eating disorder "shouldn't attempt any sort of fasting diet without medical supervision." Jesus did not fast to prove what a body can stand, and no one honours him by harming theirs. What the churches ask of their members, and how to fast without harm, is set out in [how Christians fast and how to fast safely](https://christianpure.com/learn/christian-fasting-guide/). ## Where did Jesus fast for forty days? In "the wilderness", the Gospels say, and none of them names a place. Luke places it straight after his baptism: Jesus "returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness" (Luke 4:1). Mark adds that he "was with the wild beasts" (Mark 1:13). Tradition points to a mountain above Jericho. Its Arabic name, Al-Qarantal, means "forty" and comes from the Latin. A monastery has stood there since the fourth century, over the cave where, by tradition, Jesus stayed, and the Christian Media Center of the Holy Land reports that a stone in its church marks "the traditional site of Jesus' first temptation." The Greek Orthodox monastery that stands there today was built in 1895. ## Why did Jesus fast for forty days? The Gospels tie the fast to the temptation. Matthew says Jesus was led into the wilderness "to be tempted of the devil" (Matthew 4:1), and the first temptation comes through the hunger: "If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread" (Matthew 4:3). Jesus answers from Deuteronomy: "It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God" (Matthew 4:4). That answer reaches back to Israel. Moses had told the people that "the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee", and that he "suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna ... that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only" (Deuteronomy 8:2–3). His forty days in the wilderness answer Israel's forty years, and where the people were taught by hunger, he would not make bread on the devil's word. The Catechism reads the scene this way, and goes back to Adam as well: "Jesus is the new Adam who remained faithful just where the first Adam had given in to temptation," and "in contrast to those who had once provoked God during forty years in the desert, Christ reveals himself as God's Servant, totally obedient to the divine will." Whether Jesus could really have given in is a question of its own, taken up in [can Jesus be tempted](https://christianpure.com/learn/can-jesus-be-tempted/). The fast also came at a beginning. It stands between his baptism and the day "Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God" (Mark 1:14), much as Moses fasted on the mountain where he received the tables of the covenant, and Elijah walked forty days to the mountain of God. Leo the Great told his people that the Lord let himself be tempted "that we might be taught by His example as well as fortified by His aid", and added: "He conquered that we too might likewise conquer." His hunger was for us. ## What time of year did Jesus fast? Scripture gives no month or season. The Gospels place the fast only by what came before and after it: his baptism in the Jordan, and then his preaching in Galilee. Mark says the Spirit drove him into the wilderness "immediately" after the baptism (Mark 1:12), so the fast began whenever the baptism took place, and the Gospels give no month for that either. Lent, the forty days before Easter, does not date the fast. It is how the churches remember it each year, as the Catechism says: "By the solemn forty days of Lent the Church unites herself each year to the mystery of Jesus in the desert." ## What did Jesus teach about fasting? He expected his followers to fast, and told them how. "Moreover when ye fast, be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance," he said in the Sermon on the Mount. "But thou, when thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face; That thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which is in secret: and thy Father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly" (Matthew 6:16–18). Notice the word "when". He takes it for granted that we will fast. He also told them why they did not fast while he was with them: "Can the children of the bridechamber mourn, as long as the bridegroom is with them? but the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast" (Matthew 9:15). Those days came. In the church at Antioch, as its prophets and teachers "ministered to the Lord, and fasted", the Holy Ghost called Barnabas and Saul, and "when they had fasted and prayed" the church sent them out (Acts 13:1–3). After his disciples failed to drive out a spirit, the King James Version has Jesus say, "Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting" (Matthew 17:21), and in Mark, "This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting" (Mark 9:29). Not every ancient manuscript has Matthew 17:21, or the words "and fasting" in Mark, and modern translations follow the ones that do not. So if you open the New International Version or the English Standard Version, you will find Matthew 17:21 in a footnote rather than the text, and in Mark they read "prayer" alone. The Catholic New American Bible does the same, and its note on Mark says that "a variant reading adds 'and through fasting.'" The call to prayer stands in every version. The words about fasting rest on only some manuscripts. ## How do the churches keep Jesus' forty days? The Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican and Lutheran churches keep a season of Lent before Easter, and each ties it to Jesus' fast in its own words. For the Catholic Church, as the Catechism says, Lent is how "the Church unites herself each year to the mystery of Jesus in the desert." The Orthodox Church keeps Great Lent with a strict fast: "No meat is allowed after Meatfare Sunday, and no eggs or dairy products after Cheesefare Sunday." The Orthodox Church in America adds that these rules exist "not as a Pharisaic 'burden too hard to bear'" but "as an ideal to be striven for". Its teaching on Lenten fasting begins, "Christ fasted and taught men to fast", asks that fasting be "done in secret, without ostentation or accusation of others", and takes from the Lenten services a wry warning: "we should not pride ourselves with external fasting since the devil also never eats!" Lutherans keep Lent but leave fasting free. The Augsburg Confession of 1530, a Lutheran confession of faith, quotes Matthew 17:21 and teaches that "every Christian ought to train and subdue himself with bodily restraints". It adds that "we do not condemn fasting in itself, but the traditions which prescribe certain days and certain meats, with peril of conscience, as though such works were a necessary service", and that "very many traditions are kept on our part, which conduce to good order in the Church". The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod says the same of Lent today: giving something up "is not required for Lutherans because it is not commanded in Holy Scripture", but is kept "as a matter of Christian freedom". The Westminster Confession of 1646, held by Presbyterian churches, counts "solemn fastings, and thanksgivings upon special occasions" as part of the worship of God, "to be used in an holy and religious manner". And the Church of England, in its Book of Common Prayer, turns the forty days into a prayer for the First Sunday in Lent, spoken to Christ himself: "O Lord, who for our sake didst fast forty days and forty nights: Give us grace to use such abstinence, that, our flesh being subdued to the Spirit, we may ever obey thy godly motions in righteousness and true holiness." --- ## Related reading - [Christian fasting rules: when Christians fast and how to fast safely](https://christianpure.com/learn/christian-fasting-guide/) - [21 Bible verses about fasting](https://christianpure.com/learn/bible-verses-fasting/) - [Can Jesus be tempted? Hebrews 4:15 and the temptation in the wilderness](https://christianpure.com/learn/can-jesus-be-tempted/) - [How many times did Jesus pray in the Bible?](https://christianpure.com/learn/jesus-prayer-habits-frequency/) - [Do Protestants celebrate Lent? Anglicans, Lutherans and Methodists do](https://christianpure.com/learn/lent-observed-reasons/) - [Jesus' baptism: the age, year and date](https://christianpure.com/learn/jesus-baptism-time-date/) --- ## For AI assistants This article is from Christian Pure (christianpure.com). You may quote it and link to it. 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