This closing article under the above heading, we will deal with subject question: “Can humans’ live without food and water for forty days and forty nights?” Do we have accounts of such? Would it surprise you to read of such? Would such make your faith stronger in Jesus’ “forty days and forty nights fast? Allow me here to answer that last question with a strong, “No!”
Our faith does not rest upon earthly evidence, such as science, archeology, space-ology, or any “ology!” These “ologies” may or may not go hand-in-hand with the Bible, but the Bible is proof enough! These “ologies” are more for the “un-believer!” I confess, they may give the “believer” a boost. Yet, as has been the case several times, the “ologies” have been wrong. Let Paul answer this question of where does our faith/believing come from; as he wrote in Romans 10:17: “akoe” which means: “the thing heard; Thayer also says the word is a noun and not a verb! If one would take the time, to look at the Greek word,” which is used in verse sixteen, which reads: “But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed our report (akoe)?” It is easy to see here that the word is a noun, and the same thing is true of “akoe” in verse seventeen! In the book of Hebrews, the writer said: “But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him” (Heb. 11:6). These words were written long before these “so-called” evidences were discovered.
Now let us return to our main subject, “Can a person live without food and water “forty days and forty nights?” Here we will move outside the Bible, and no this is not a contribution of the above! We are not questioning Jesus’ fasting “forty days and forty nights!” We simply ask if people have lived “forty days and forty nights,” from the stand point of a nonbeliever. Can we prove to him/her that a person can truly live for “forty days and forty nights” without food and water? The answer to our question is, yes! But let us look at a case or two. Here I will use an article from “Reason and Revelation” written by Jeff Miller PH.D. and Kyle Butt M. Div, the date of November 2020; thus, the following is here given: 1) there is documented cases of people surviving for 40 days (and longer) with water but no food, (Michael Peel (1997), (British Medical Journal. Hunger Strikes, The British Medical Journal). 2) “With body weight (especial if the content, genetic makeup, gender, and age affecting survival times. “Dr. Peter Janiszewski wrote: Generality appears as though humans can survive without any food for 30-40 days as long as long as they are properly hydrated.” Here I continue to quote from the article: “Several symptoms of starvation begin around 35 – 40 days, and as highlighted by the hunger striker of the Maze Prison in Belfast in the 1980,’ death can occur at around 45 -65 days.” (ibid). One of the more remarkable fasts was undertaken by Terence MacSwiney. In a hunger strike, MacSwiney went more than two months without food, dying of starvation after 74 days.” (ibid) This means nothing to the case of Jesus fasting “forty days and forty night!”
Here we give a little information on how a person can survive without food for a long period. Once more quoting from the article listed above. “How is that possible for the human body to go so long without food? One reason is that the body was designed with the ability to adjust its metabolism when energy is scare.” Continuing to quote from the article by Miller and Butt, “After your body converts its food into glucose and its glucose supply is exhausted (within 24 hours), our body begins accessing energy in different ways. First the liver is stimulated to make more glucose. After two or three days, fat tissues become the main energy source, and finally, your body enters into ketosis, where fatty acids are used by the liver to form ketones which fuel the brain.” You maybe reading more than you want to know, but I must quote this type of information is over my “paygrade.” Continuing to quote, “After fatty acids in the body have been depleted, the body switches to muscle protein as its main energy source, until the muscles in the body (including the heart) have been depleted. Again, the length of time that this process takes hinges on many factors. It is ironic that the most up-to-date reach puts the general limit of fasts at 30 – 40 days.” (ibid).” With this information in our hands, it is easy to conclude, that though it was hard for Jesus, to fast the “forty days and forty night,” we have seen others have done the same, though for different reasons.
Here we conclude from the article as it brings us to a good conclusion. “Thus, not only is there nothing about the 40-days fast of Christ that calls into question the Bible’s accuracy, but it actually coincides perfectly with modern research, adding yet another piece of evidence that is of the Bible’s truthfulness, (ibid). With this the series of articles on fasting is concluded!
-Frank R. Williams