How to Day of Atonement?

Today's the last Sabbath before the Day of Atonement. So, I planned on spending today in some capacity trying to figure out what I was going to do that day.

My first step was to check back in Leviticus 23 where the feasts are mentioned for any info on what God told the Israelites in the Bible to do, which gave me these verses:

And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: "Also the tenth day of this seventh month shall be the Day of Atonement. It shall be a holy convocation for you; you shall afflict your souls, and offer an offering made by fire to the Lord. And you shall do no work on that same day, for it is the Day of Atonement, to make atonement for you before the Lord your God. For any person who is not afflicted in soul on that same day shall be cut off from his people. And any person who does any work on that same day, that person I will destroy from among his people. You shall do no manner of work; it shall be a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwellings. It shall be to you a sabbath of solemn rest, and you shall afflict your souls; on the ninth day of the month at evening, from evening to evening, you shall celebrate your sabbath."

- Leviticus 23:26-32 NKJV

From that bit, what I got was that, like many of the other feasts, this was like the weekly Sabbaths in that they weren't supposed to do work that day. However, one thing in particular that they were supposed to do was to "afflict their souls", which I wasn't quite sure what that meant, so I went to do some research.

Finding the chapter in Blue Letter Bible (a site where you can see the corresponding Hebrew/Greek words that form the basis of what the Bible reads), I found that the word used for "afflict" was Strong's H6031 (עָנָה; ʿānâ). Which basically means, at least in this context, humble or weaken oneself, typically by fasting.

This was somewhat ironic for me, since I had just went to a Bible Study at my Dad's church this past Wednesday, and the group had just came out of a "Time of Alignment", which involved them fasting for 7 days from something, and it had me wondering what fasting was supposed to be about. From what I understood, it was something you did to get closer to God... right?

With that being said, I went down another rabbit hole.

First, remembering the episode of The Chosen that Juneau and I were watching last night, I started looking in the Gospels for anything Jesus said about fasting, which lead me to the incident when some of John's disciples were asking Jesus why He and His disciples didn't fast, despite the fact that they and the Pharisees did. Jesus then gives the analogy about bridegroom and his friends, new cloth and old garments, and new wine and old wineskins, however, it wasn't really clicking in my head.

So, I went and started looking across the Old Testament.

I found some instances where someone would call for a fast, and during those times, it was when they needed God. I'm not sure whether or not it was a thing of them believing that if they afflicted themselves physically, then God would listen to them and act, but it lead me to think that, in the New Testament, since the people of Israel hadn't heard from God for centuries (I could be wrong about that), they were probably doing a lot of fasting in an attempt to get something from God, but alas, nothing. At some point or another, fasting probably became less about trying to get God to listen and more of a show to put on so they can feel like God was pleased with them.

However, I made a really intriguing discovery when I was looking instances of fasting in the Old Testament. The Torah (the first 5 books of the Bible) had no instances of fasting recorded at all. God never even gave them any instructions on how to fast. In fact, the earliest usage of Strong's H6684, צוּם (ṣûm), isn't found until Judges. This had me wondering if the Israelites either came up with this to try and get God to listen to them whenever they needed help, or got it from another nation like Egypt.

So, with that newfound information, I was basically thrown for a loop. Did they never need to fast at all? What was going on?

So, I asked my friends what the purpose of fasting was. Juneau responded with,

By definition to within your needs and allow God to fill in for those needs such as hunger

Adding on that food isn't the only thing you can fast from.

So, I went on a rabbit hole talking about the discovery I made, and within the time that I went to actually get going with my day, Dentaure, our teacher and friend, responded in a series of texts:

Fasting is good to clear your mind

To know what to actually pray about

Cause ur brain isn't distracted

By the nonsense

Meditate on what the Father said through your teachers

Meditate on what the Father said through your family

Meditate on what the Father showed you through providential revelations. [Providential revelation: information where God provided the individual in their own right time]

So, with that being said, I now had a much different idea of what the Day of Atonement was about. It was a day of reflection of sorts. A day to reflect on what God had done for them in the past and what God had brought them through as well so they could pray and ask for His help, which was why they called for fasts.

So, in a way, at least for me, the Day of Atonement is a day to reflect on what God has done for me, what He's taught me through others, and how He's blessed me. That way, I can ask Him to help me to be humble and ready for whatever blessings He has in store for me this upcoming Feast of Tabernacles, because I can't be ready on my own. I need His help in this.