It needs to be emphasised once again that the true benefits of fasting are spiritual and connected with religion. The physical benefits are also substantial and cannot be ignored. Some of the very many benefits are enumerated below:

1. it is an excellent religious discipline which trains the mind and body to cope with crisis, anger, hunger, thirst, etc. According to one mystic, the secret of life is to speak little, eat little and sleep little. All these disciplines are exercised during the month of fasting.
2. it encourages prayers, almsgiving, the doing of other good deeds and refraining from evil giving one power to overcome all evil.
3. it liberates the spirit to detach itself from worldly pursuits to seek a healthy living relationship with God Almighty thereby increasing one’s faith. Man acquires for a period Godly attri­butes e.g. God does not sleep or eat, only goodness emanates from Him.
4. as great emphasis is placed on reciting the Holy Quran, it can be a wonderful source of guidance, and revelation or com­munion with God.
5. it also encourages the growth of grace, forbearance, fortitude, humility. simplicity. sacrifice — if man can sacrifice food and water, be can also sacrifice his life for God.
6. it restores one’s health. Some doctors have developed a system of health through an almost exclusive use of fasting.
7. it is medically proven that those who fast for a long period regain a fine head of hair and recapture part of youth and physical growth.
8. in his book ‘Preservation of Health‘, Dr. H. A. Morton Whitby, a well-known surgeon has shown that over-eating can have very dire consequences and that fasting can be a genuine source of health. Dr. Otto H F. Buckinger in his book ‘About Fasting’ takes the same view.
9. it cures addiction to alcoholism, drugs, smoking which are all injurious to one’s health.
10. it curbs carnal pleasures of the flesh so that sexual desires are not misspent.

These arc but a few of the very many benefits of fasting.

Bishop Jeremy Taylor once wrote: ‘He who would recount the benefits of fasting, might just as well in the next page, attempt to enumerate the benefits of medicine.’