Man Believes Day Of 9-Av Fasting Offsets Gluttony Of Other 364

“I’m not twenty years old anymore.”

Beit Shemesh, July 30 – A resident of this town southwest of Jerusalem plans to take full dietary advantage of the traditional Jewish practice of not eating for a full twenty-four hours from Wednesday to Thursday evening, local sources report, under the ambitious assumption that abstaining from caloric intake during that time will allow him to engage in wanton caloric intake the remainder of the year.

Gedalyah Zaftig, 35, voiced his understanding Wednesday evening that the full-day fast of the ninth of Av – Tish’a B’Av – during which Jews mourn various calamities, among them the destruction of the Holy Temple in both 586 BCE and 70 CE, will help him go some distance in mitigating the impact of his everyday eating habits, he hopes to the point that the fast will offset whatever he eats during the hundreds of non-fasting days on the calendar.

“There have already been a bunch of fast days this year,” he noted to a friend who declined to be identified. “Put those six days together and that puts a serious dent in how much I would otherwise eat. With that reduction in the bag, I can go easy on myself the rest of the time. I could go for a cheese danish right about now, for example. I’ll get one as soon as I finish this pizza lunch.”

Mr. Zaftig acknowledged the importance of controlling his food intake. “I’m not twenty years old anymore,” he noted. “I can’t just down endless quantities of french fries and beer without it putting some strain on my waistband anymore. I have to be careful. I have to be responsible. I’ve got a wife and five kids, and they need me. So Tish’a B’Av is important for more than just spiritual reasons now.”

Zaftig also gave attention to the ethical aspects of the fast day. “It’s not just about grieving, about loss and breakdown,” he explained. “Our ancient sources already admonish us to use the fasting as a way to foster empathy for those who face hunger all the time, and to act on that empathy to make our community, our society, a better place. Doing that requires a level of sensitivity and attentiveness that I probably don’t achieve as often or as intensely as I should, but at least I think a half-dozen times per year how the poor must feel. I bet like me, they crave a good corned-beef-on-rye right now.”

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