It is well known that most Jewish rituals are associated with food: honeycake for Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year), cheesecake for Shavuot (Pentecost) and doughnuts for Chanukah to name but a few.
This is why every Jewish household contains both at least one celebrity chef but many food critics! It is therefore noteworthy when a ritual is associated with abstinence from consuming food and imbibing liquids. There are in fact a number of minor fasts in the Jewish calendar, but the one that is observed by the majority of Jews is Yom Kippur: the Day of Atonement.
However, more important than whether one does or doesn’t eat, is the motivation for doing so: for one Biblically ordained, 24-hour period in a year, to put worldly material concerns aside and to focus internally on our being, our deeds and their foundation in moral fibre.
Read more at The Times Online http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article6849309.ece
or at www.npls.org.uk