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As the Great Fast approaches, I'd like to know a little more about fasting in the East and West Syrian traditions.

How do Chaldean/Syrian/Maronite/Syro-Malankara Catholics fast? How do their non-Catholic counterparts fast?

To start us off, I'll quote the rules currently in force for the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church, and I'll share some fasting practices of the Assyrians circa 1920.

From the Syro-Malabar Particular Law:
If you ask me, this seems like a complete Latinization.

As for Assyrian practices (not the official rules) around the year 1920, I gleaned the following from [i]Assyrian Church Customs and the Murder of Mar Shimun[/i] [aina.org] , by Surma D'Bait Mar Shimun, the sister of the Assyrian Patriarch at the time. (This short book, by the way, is quite interesting in its own right, as it deals not only with Assyrian customs, but also with the plight of the Assyrian people around World War I.)

• Eucharistic Fast:
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• Fast until after the Qurbana of the day.

[*]Subbara/Annunciation/Advent:

• <font size="2" face="verdana, geneva, lucida, 'lucida grande', arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Abstain from all animal products.

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[*]The three days before Epiphany/Denha (6 January):

• <font size="2" face="verdana, geneva, lucida, 'lucida grande', arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Abstain from all meat and meat products.

</font></li>
[*]Ba�utha d�Niniwayi/Rogation of the Ninivites:

• <font size="2" face="verdana, geneva, lucida, 'lucida grande', arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Abstain from all animal products.
• Fast until sunset, or until 3pm, or at least until noon.

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[*]Sawma Rabba/Great Fast/Lent:

• <font size="2" face="verdana, geneva, lucida, 'lucida grande', arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Abstain from all animal products.
• Fast until sunset, or until 3pm, or at least until noon.

</font></li>
[*]Sundays in the Great Fast:

• <font size="2" face="verdana, geneva, lucida, 'lucida grande', arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Abstain from all animal products.
• Fast only until after the Qurbana of the day.

</font></li>
[*]Good Friday:

• <font size="2" face="verdana, geneva, lucida, 'lucida grande', arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Abstain from all animal products.
• Fast until sunset, or at least until 4pm.
• It is customary to break the fast with bitter herbs.

</font></li>
[*]Great Sabbath/Holy Saturday:

• <font size="2" face="verdana, geneva, lucida, 'lucida grande', arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Abstain from all animal products.
• Fast until after the first Qurbana of Qyamta/Resurrection/Pascha, which begins at sunset.

</font></li>
[*]Slihe/Fast of the Apostles:

• <font size="2" face="verdana, geneva, lucida, 'lucida grande', arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Abstain from all meat and meat products.

</font></li></ul><font size="2" face="verdana, geneva, lucida, 'lucida grande', arial, helvetica, sans-serif">

Peace,
Alex

If you ask me, this seems like a complete Latinization.

Alex:

Why do you jump to this conclusion? Did Rome impose this on your sui juris Church or did your bishops come up with this abbreviated--I assume from the way you present this--set of fasting regulations on their own? If they came up with it on their own, how can it be a "Latinization"?

The fasting rules in the Latin Church in the United States were different before Vatican II from Europe and other parts of the world because the bishops here asked Rome for an indult relaxing the universal rules for pastoral reasons. Does that make the modified pattern an "Americanization"?

Do you think it possible that your bishops decided on this modified fasting regimne for pastoral reasons?

Beyond all this, there are two entirely different approaches to how the Latin and the Eastern Churches modify fasting regimens when it is felt to be pastorally necessary--in my experience. In the Latin Church, it seems that everyone must march in lock-step. So if there appears to be a need to modify fasting regulations and the same request seems to come in frequently, the usual move is to simplify the entire regimen so that there is little or no need to make individual exceptions. That doesn't mean that one is forbidden to take on a greater penance, but it does have a tendency to reduce things to the lowest common denominator over the long run.

It seems that our Eastern brethren--my experience has been with Byzantine Orthodox Christians--have less problem with the idea that one could have the fasting regimen modified by one's confessor or pastor and that this is something that is normal. My experience has been that my confessor was concerned that I observe the spirit of the fast as far as my own physical circumstances and constitution would allow and add something else to my penance practices--positive penance, for example, like an extra period each day of spiritual reading.

I think it all goes to the mindset that each Church seems to start from. The Latin Church has historically been very legalistic. Some fasting rules from the turn of the 20th century in the United Staees, for example, have the faithful weighing eggs to see if they could be used as part of the Lenten diet: a three ounce egg passed muster; a four-ounce egg was a no-no. In addition, my experiences with Latins always come around to the question "what do I HAVE to do?" We Latins tend to raise a ruckus if someone seems to get off easier than we do, even if the reason is that someone cannot physically observe the fast. (Please understand that this does not mean that there were and are not pastoral exceptions, but they are not as widely accepted or known as they seem to be in the East.)

On the other hand, Orthodox Christians seem to be acutely sensitive to the extent of their own and other's fasting, and to the severity of what people may be observing. It may be that the strict adherence to the whole monastic rule is much more difficult. However, it has been my experience that Orthodox Christians are very much aware that not everyone may be fasting at the same level of strictness as they may be and they tend to be very accomodating to the guest when serving meals during Lent. On the other hand, it is not unusual for someone to adopt a stricter fasting regimen than other members of one's family or parish with the approval of one's confessor, but that is something that is part of the whole pattern of one's walk with the Lord within Orthodoxy.

Please understand, Alex, that this is a vast oversimplification and painted with a broad brush. My attempt has been to show how different conclusions can arise from similar circumstances. Remember, too, that your bishops are part of the Catholic world. In the Catholic world, it seems to me, we have less tolerance for the "untidiness" of having people in the same family or parish at different levels of fasting--we gotta just tough it out and eveyone's got to soldier up.

In Christ,

BOB

Dear Michael_Thoma,

Thank you for posting the West Syrian fasting rules/traditions !


Alex

Dear BOB/theophan,

Thanks for your post. I certainly hope that this relaxation in the Syro-Malabar fasting rules was done for pastoral reasons. The reason I'm guessing that it's a "Latinization", though, is that the rules are almost identical to the Latin fasting rules currently in force (graciously posted by Carole).

We Syrian Christians of St. Thomas are quite proud of the fact that we're St. Thomas Christians, but I get the feeling that Syro-Malabar Catholics in particular sometimes forget that we are a "sui juris" Church; our norms and rules are often much more similar to the Latin rules than to the East Syrian traditions (or to any Eastern Christian traditions, for that matter).

By "Latinization", I don't necessarily mean coercion: Latinization occurs, not only when the Latin Church forces an Eastern Catholic Church to adopt a practice of the Latin Church, but also when an Eastern Catholic Church freely chooses to adopt a practice in imitation of the Latin Church (instead of a adopting or revitalizing a practice rooted in that Eastern Church's own tradition).

Again, I don't know the history behind the current Syro-Malabar fasting rules, and I hope that pastoral concerns were primary in the formation of these rules. I am much more inclined to suspect, though, that influence from the Latin Church played a greater role than pastoral reasons.


Peace,
Alex