Fasting — the long kind.
The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church keeps seven fasting seasons and asks around 180 days a year of laypeople, up to about 250 of clergy and the devout: no animal products, and often nothing at all before the ninth hour. Western Lent asks for one meatless Friday and a bad mood.
The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church keeps the strictest fasting regime in Christianity: seven canonical fasting seasons, roughly 180 obligatory days a year for laypeople and up to around 250 for clergy and the especially observant. Fasting means no meat, dairy or eggs, and on many days no food at all before the ninth hour, about three in the afternoon. This is why Ethiopian cuisine has a complete parallel vegan repertoire — shiro, misir wot, the fasting beyaynetu — that exists for religious reasons and is now exported as a cuisine in its own right. The Fast of the Prophets, Tsome Nebiyat, runs about forty-three days before Christmas; the Great Fast before Easter is the longest. Western Lent by comparison asks for abstinence from meat on Fridays and two days of reduced eating, and even that is widely treated as optional.
The fasting regime of the Ethiopian Church is the strictest of any Church, with 180 mandatory fasting days for laypeople and up to 252 days for clergy and the particularly observant.
Summary of Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo fasting practice (rendered)Seven canonical fasting seasons; the Fast of the Prophets alone runs about forty-three days before Christmas.
The same ground, other faiths
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