Holding Fast

I’m no psychologist, but it isn’t hard to diagnose America with preelection depression that has dragged on into the dog days of summer. Perhaps the Jewish fast day of Tisha B’Av, which begins this year on the evening of Monday, Aug. 12, can serve as an occasion for introspection and renewal for the whole country. While the occasion commemorates the societal disarray that led to the Jerusalem Temple’s destruction two millennia ago, its call for communal cohesion can revive Uncle Sam’s currently morose mood and sense of purpose as we hope for brighter days ahead amid the surrounding civic disarray. And, if Americans actually took the day as a national fast, they’d be in pretty good company—alongside George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, who understood the spiritual value of fasting.

Finding themselves mired in the bloody battles of the American Revolution, the colonists were feeling broken. War against the forces of King George III was feeling endlessly exhausting. So on Dec. 11, 1776, the Continental Congress called on the newborn country to seek divine salvation by coming together in days bereft of bread, but full of faithful prayer and moral reformation. The fight with Great Britain “has not only been prolonged, but is likely to be carried to the greatest extremity,” the proclamation began. Then, as now, most thought only a miracle could salvage the U.S.’s sorry state. Congress turned in hope “to reverence the Providence of God, and look up to him as the supreme disposer of all events.”

It was:

Resolved, That it be recommended to all the United States, as soon as possible, to appoint a day of solemn fasting and humiliation; to implore of Almighty God the forgiveness of the many sins prevailing among all ranks, and to beg the countenance and assistance of his Providence in the prosecution of the present just and necessary war.

The fast day’s exact date would be left up to the individual states to decide for themselves. But the collective goal was “the exercise of repentance and reformation,” galvanizing God to support their sagging spirits.

The day of spiritual sustenance being just what the doctor ordered, the American Revolution would eventually succeed. So when the Continental Congress declared another call for communal solidarity, it would be for the occasion of feasting, not fasting: On Oct. 26, 1781, the grateful Founders expressed boundless gratitude that “it hath pleased Almighty God, the Father of Mercies, remarkably to assist and support the United States of America in their important struggle for liberty against the long-continued efforts of a powerful nation.” Calling for the 13th day of December to be a day of “thanksgiving and prayer,” this time, Congress, channeling the prophet Isaiah, called for a day celebrating a biblical-level redemption.

… that all the people may assemble on that day with grateful hearts to celebrate the praises of our glorious Benefactor, to confess our manifold sins, to offer up our most fervent supplications to the God of all grace that it may please Him to pardon our offense, and incline our hearts for the future, to keep all His laws, to comfort and relieve all our brethren who are in distress or captivity, to prosper our husbandmen, and give strength to all engaged in lawful commerce; to impart wisdom and integrity to our counselors, judgment and fortitude to our officers and soldiers; to protect and prosper our illustrious ally and favor our united exertions for the speedy establishment of a safe, honorable, and lasting peace, to bless our seminaries of learning, and cause the knowledge of God to cover the earth as the waters cover the seas.

In bright days as in bad ones, Americans were called to be generous in spirit, righteous in judgment, and to maintain a sense of shared purpose despite differences. Now that the war was won, it was time to comfort the bereaved, offer loyalty to allies, and ensure the country’s educational system produced leaders of goodwill, learning, and honor.

Alas, like the ancient Israelites amid their desert wandering, Americans would backslide into their self-defeating ways. So it was that on March 23, 1798, President John Adams called for a “Day of Fasting, Humiliation and Prayer,” as the nascent United States and France began to come to blows. After all, “in seasons of difficulty or of danger, when existing or threatening calamities, the just judgments of God against prevalent iniquity, are a loud call to repentance and reformation; and as the United States of America are at present placed in a hazardous and afflictive situation by the unfriendly disposition, conduct, and demands of a foreign power.”

“Under these considerations,” the president wrote, “it has appeared to me that the duty of imploring the mercy and benediction of Heaven on our country demands at this time a special attention from its inhabitants.” A reaffirmation of national solidarity was once again called for, “that the American people may be united in those bonds of amity and mutual confidence and inspired with that vigor and fortitude by which they have in times past been so highly distinguished and by which they have obtained such invaluable advantages.”

If Americans could stand in solidarity with their fellow citizens, no country on earth could withstand their collective spiritual might. “The principles of genuine piety and sound morality,” Adams hoped, “may influence the minds and govern the lives of every description of our citizens, and that the blessings of peace, freedom, and pure religion may be speedily extended to all the nations of the earth.”

Unfortunately, despite this call, and a second public fast declared on March 6, 1799, Adams was unable to muster the might needed to avoid two years of skirmishes with the French on the high seas.

A few short years later, when the British came barking back to our shores during the War of 1812, President James Madison adapted a now familiar strategy. On July 9, he called for another day of fasting and prayer “for the devout purposes of rendering the Sovereign of the Universe and the Benefactor of Mankind the public homage due to His holy attributes; of acknowledging the transgressions which might justly provoke the manifestations of His divine displeasure; of seeking His merciful forgiveness and His assistance in the great duties of repentance and amendment, and especially of offering fervent supplications that in the present season of calamity and war He would take the American people under His peculiar care and protection.”

Though the war would result in the humiliating burning of the White House by British forces, the U.S. would eventually recover and achieve success.

America would not forgo fasting just yet. Around the midpoint of the Civil Year, Abraham Lincoln, leading a nation he referred to as “God’s almost chosen people,” declared “Thursday, the 30th day of April 1863 as a day of national humiliation, fasting and prayer.” Each citizen was asked “to confess their sins and transgressions, in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord.”

Lamenting, in language reminiscent of Moses’ rebuke in Deuteronomy, how “we have forgotten God,” Lincoln expressed remorse on behalf of the nation that “we have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us.” Through the “deceitfulness of our hearts,” Americans “have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!” The South, in turn, had held fasts in July 1861, and would do so again in August of both 1863 and 1864. (Earlier, a week before South Carolina had broken away from the Union, President James Buchanan had called for one on Jan. 4, 1861, in a flailing attempt to stem secession.) Lincoln’s leadership, and perhaps the Lord’s guiding hand, led to an eventual Northern victory and reuniting of the states.

Americans today, regretfully, are on the whole likely too proud to pray, let alone fast for 24 hours. Yet even those not mourning the Temple’s destruction this Tisha B’Av can take a few moments to channel our colonial era forefathers’ and Great Emancipator’s successful efforts to avoid similarly sorry fates. Dedicating ourselves to a union more perfect and a land whose promise we can help fulfill through charity, integrity and blessings of peace, will, with heaven’s help, alleviate our collective hunger for more hopeful days.