Hebrew word · H6685

צוֹם

tzom

fast

To abstain from food (and usually drink) for a set time. It was done in mourning, repentance, petition in a crisis, or preparation, often with sackcloth, ashes, weeping and bowed heads (v. 5).

Appears 26 times in 22 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

fast, fasting

Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of Isaiah 58:3

Range of meaning

To abstain from food (and usually drink) for a set time. It was done in mourning, repentance, petition in a crisis, or preparation, often with sackcloth, ashes, weeping and bowed heads (v. 5).

Against the English

English 'fast' is accurate. What a modern reader may miss is that in Israel it was mainly a public, communal act of pleading with God, not a private discipline or a health practice.

Used elsewhere in the period

Judges 20:26; 1 Samuel 7:6; Joel 1:14; 2:12–15; Jonah 3:5–9; Ezra 8:21–23; Nehemiah 9:1; Zechariah 7:3–5; 8:19 (fasts mourning Jerusalem's fall); Esther 4:16.

From the study of Daniel 9:3

Range of meaning

A fast: going without food (often also without drink), usually for a day, from morning to evening, sometimes longer (Esth 4:16, three days). Its uses were mourning (2 Sam 1:12), repentance before threatened judgment (Joel 2:12; Jonah 3:5), intercession in a crisis (2 Sam 12:16; Ezra 8:21–23; Esth 4:3) and humbling oneself (Ps 35:13; Isa 58:3–5).

Against the English

'Fasting' is the right word. Modern readers may picture a partial diet (the popular 'Daniel fast' comes from Dan 1:12 and 10:3, not this verse) or a health or discipline practice. Here it is a mourning rite.

How it drifted

In modern use fasting has become a personal spiritual discipline or a dietary regime. In Israel it belonged to the language of grief and humiliation, alongside torn clothes, sackcloth and ashes.

Used elsewhere in the period

After the fall of Jerusalem the exiles kept regular fasts that commemorated the disaster. Zechariah 7:3–5 and 8:19 mention fasts in the 4th, 5th, 7th and 10th months, and 7:5 says they had been kept 'these seventy years'. Nehemiah 1:4 (fasting and mourning for Jerusalem's ruins) and Nehemiah 9:1 (fasting, sackcloth and earth) are close later parallels.

From the study of Isaiah 58:5

Range of meaning

Abstaining from food, sometimes from water too, for a day or longer. It was done in mourning (2 Sam 1:12), repentance (Jonah 3:5; Joel 2:12), urgent petition (2 Sam 12:16; Esth 4:16) and preparation before God (Ezra 8:21). Fasts could be individual or proclaimed for a whole community.

Against the English

'Fast' is accurate. Modern readers may picture a private spiritual discipline or a dieting practice. In Israel fasting was mostly public, bodily and communal, and it went with sackcloth, ashes, torn clothes and loud lament.

Used elsewhere in the period

After the Exile, Zechariah 7:3–5 and 8:19 mention regular fasts in the 4th, 5th, 7th and 10th months marking the fall of Jerusalem, and God asks: 'Was it really for me that you fasted?' Joel 1:14 and 2:15 tell the people to 'sanctify a fast'. The Day of Atonement was the one fast the Torah commanded.

Where it appears

2 Samuel · 1

  1. 2 Samuel 12:16 צ֔וֹם a fast

    David pleaded with God for the boy. He fasted and went into his house and spent the night lying in sackcloth on the ground.

    Here: The noun comes from the same root as the verb, so the text literally says "he fasted a fast." This doubling is common Hebrew style. It underlines that this was a real, deliberate fast.

1 Kings · 2

  1. 1 Kings 21:9 צ֔וֹם a fast

    In the letters she wrote: “Proclaim a fast and give Naboth a seat of honor among the people.

  2. 1 Kings 21:12 צ֑וֹם a fast

    They proclaimed a fast and gave Naboth a seat of honor among the people.

2 Chronicles · 1

  1. 2 Chronicles 20:3 צ֖וֹם a fast

    Jehoshaphat was alarmed and set his face to seek the LORD. And he proclaimed a fast throughout Judah.

    Here: Going without food, usually together with lament, sackcloth and a gathering at the sanctuary. It is a public act of humbling oneself and pleading before God in a crisis.

Ezra · 1

  1. Ezra 8:21 צוֹם֙ a fast

    And there by the Ahava Canal I proclaimed a fast, so that we might humble ourselves before our God and ask Him for a safe journey for us and our children, with all our possessions.

    Here: A communal abstention from food (and often drink), a recognised public act of humbling and supplication before God in times of danger or need.

Nehemiah · 1

  1. Nehemiah 9:1 בְּצ֣וֹם with fasting

    On the twenty-fourth day of the same month, the Israelites gathered together, fasting and wearing sackcloth, with dust on their heads.

    Here: Going without food, done as a whole community. It was the bodily sign of humbling yourself and mourning before God, and it prepares for the long confession in 9:5–37.

Esther · 2

  1. Esther 4:3 וְצ֥וֹם and fasting

    In every province to which the king’s command and edict came, there was great mourning among the Jews. They fasted, wept, and lamented, and many lay in sackcloth and ashes.

  2. Esther 9:31 הַצֹּמ֖וֹת the fasts

    in order to confirm these days of Purim at their appointed time, just as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther had established them and had committed themselves and their descendants to the times of fasting and lamentation.

Psalms · 3

  1. Psalm 35:13 בַצּ֣וֹם with <the> fasting

    Yet when they were ill, I put on sackcloth; I humbled myself with fasting, but my prayers returned unanswered.

    Here: 'With the fast.' The way he afflicted himself was by going without food. The word 'the' may point to the familiar, recognised practice of fasting.

  2. Psalm 69:10 בַצּ֣וֹם with <the> fasting

    I wept and fasted, but it brought me reproach.

  3. Psalm 109:24 מִצּ֑וֹם from fasting

    My knees are weak from fasting, and my body grows lean and gaunt.

Isaiah · 4

  1. Isaiah 58:3 צֹֽמְכֶם֙ fasting your

    “Why have we fasted, and You have not seen? Why have we humbled ourselves, and You have not noticed?” “Behold, on the day of your fast, you do as you please, and you oppress all your workers.

    Here: 'Your fast.' God calls it 'your' fast (plural 'you'), which quietly separates it from the fast God chooses (v. 6, 'the fast that I choose').

  2. Isaiah 58:5 צ֣וֹם צ֔וֹם [the] fast, a fast

    Is this the fast I have chosen: a day for a man to deny himself, to bow his head like a reed, and to spread out sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast and a day acceptable to the LORD?

    Here: A fast: going without food (often without drink too) as a public or private act of mourning, repentance or pleading with God.

  3. Isaiah 58:6 צ֣וֹם [the] fast

    Isn’t this the fast that I have chosen: to break the chains of wickedness, to untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and tear off every yoke?

    Here: A public religious fast: going without food, usually with sackcloth, ashes and bowed heads, to humble oneself before God and plead for his attention. The word is kept, but its content is redefined.

Jeremiah · 2

  1. Jeremiah 36:6 צ֑וֹם fasting

    so you are to go to the house of the LORD on a day of fasting, and in the hearing of the people you are to read the words of the LORD from the scroll you have written at my dictation. Read them in the hearing of all the people of Judah who are coming from their cities.

  2. Jeremiah 36:9 צ֜וֹם a fast

    Now in the ninth month of the fifth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, a fast before the LORD was proclaimed to all the people of Jerusalem and all who had come there from the cities of Judah.

Daniel · 1

  1. Daniel 9:3 בְּצ֖וֹם with fasting

    So I turned my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and petition, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes.

    Here: Going without food as an act of mourning and self-humbling. 'In' describes the condition Daniel prays in: his body takes part in the prayer.

Joel · 3

  1. Joel 1:14 צוֹם֙ a fast

    Consecrate a fast; proclaim a solemn assembly! Gather the elders and all the residents of the land to the house of the LORD your God, and cry out to the LORD.

    Here: Going without food (and often drink) as a public act of grief, humbling and pleading before God. In Israel it went together with sackcloth, ashes, torn clothes and loud lament.

  2. Joel 2:12 וּבְצ֥וֹם and with fasting

    “Yet even now,” declares the LORD, “return to Me with all your heart, with fasting, weeping, and mourning.”

    Here: “And with fasting”: going without food as a public act of humbling yourself before God. Joel calls for an official community fast in 1:14 and 2:15.

  3. Joel 2:15 צ֖וֹם a fast

    Blow the ram’s horn in Zion, consecrate a fast, proclaim a sacred assembly.

    Here: A public fast: everyone going without food together, usually with sackcloth, weeping and prayer for help. It was the community's way of mourning before God in a crisis, here locusts and drought that had wiped out the harvest and the temple offerings (1:9–13).

Jonah · 1

  1. Jonah 3:5 צוֹם֙ a fast

    And the Ninevites believed God. They proclaimed a fast and dressed in sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least.

    Here: A public, announced time of going without food (and often drink). It was a communal rite of mourning and pleading in the face of disaster, not a private discipline.

Zechariah · 4

  1. Zechariah 8:19 צ֣וֹם וְצ֣וֹם וְצ֨וֹם וְצ֣וֹם [the] fast of, and [the] fast of

    “This is what the LORD of Hosts says: The fasts of the fourth, the fifth, the seventh, and the tenth months will become times of joy and gladness, cheerful feasts for the house of Judah. Therefore you are to love both truth and peace.”

    Here: A day of going without food, joined to mourning and lament. Here it means the yearly fasts that remembered the fall of Jerusalem.

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.