This is a list of all the references to fasting in the Bible. Other than the first five, that do not explicitly mention fasting, the rest of the list does. This does not make it exhaustive, but does give us a pretty good picture.
Exodus 34:28: Moses was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights without eating bread or drinking water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant – the Ten Commandments.
Leviticus 16:29: This is to be a lasting ordinance for you: on the tenth day of the seventh month you must deny yourselves [fast] and not do any work – whether native-born or a foreigner residing among you
Leviticus 16:31: It is a day of sabbath rest, and you must deny yourselves [fast]; it is a lasting ordinance.
Deuteronomy 9:9: When I went up on the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant that the Lord had made with you, I stayed on the mountain for forty days and forty nights; I ate no bread and drank no water
Deuteronomy 9:18: Then once again I fell prostrate before the Lord for forty days and forty nights; I ate no bread and drank no water, because of all the sin you had committed, doing what was evil in the Lord’s sight and so arousing his anger
Judges 20:26: Then all the Israelites, the whole army, went up to Bethel, and there they sat weeping before the Lord. They fasted that day until evening and presented burnt offerings and fellowship offerings to the Lord.
1 Samuel 7:6: When they had assembled at Mizpah, they drew water and poured it out before the Lord. On that day they fasted and there they confessed, ‘We have sinned against the Lord.’ Now Samuel was serving as leader of Israel at Mizpah.
1 Samuel 31:13: Then they took their bones and buried them under a tamarisk tree at Jabesh, and they fasted seven days.
2 Samuel 1:12: They mourned and wept and fasted till evening for Saul and his son Jonathan, and for the army of the Lord and for the nation of Israel, because they had fallen by the sword.
2 Samuel 12:16: David pleaded with God for the child. He fasted and spent the nights lying in sackcloth on the ground.
2 Samuel 12:21: His attendants asked him, ‘Why are you acting in this way? While the child was alive, you fasted and wept, but now that the child is dead, you get up and eat!’
2 Samuel 12:22: He answered, ‘While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept. I thought, “Who knows? The Lord may be gracious to me and let the child live.”
2 Samuel 12:23: But now that he is dead, why should I go on fasting? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me.’
1 Kings 21:9: In those letters she wrote: ‘Proclaim a day of fasting and give Naboth a prominent seat among the people.
1 Kings 21:12: They proclaimed a fast and seated Naboth in a prominent place among the people.
1 Kings 21:27: When Ahab heard these words, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and fasted. He lay in sackcloth and went around meekly.
1 Chronicles 10:12: All their valiant men went and took the bodies of Saul and his sons and brought them to Jabesh. Then they buried their bones under the great tree in Jabesh, and they fasted seven days.
2 Chronicles 20:3: Alarmed, Jehoshaphat resolved to enquire of the Lord, and he proclaimed a fast for all Judah.
Ezra 8:21: There, by the Ahava Canal, I proclaimed a fast, so that we might humble ourselves before our God and ask him for a safe journey for us and our children, with all our possessions.
Ezra 8:23: So we fasted and petitioned our God about this, and he answered our prayer.
Nehemiah 1:4: When I heard these things, I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven.
Nehemiah 9:1: On the twenty-fourth day of the same month, the Israelites gathered together, fasting and wearing sackcloth and putting dust on their heads.
Esther 4:3: In every province to which the edict and order of the king came, there was great mourning among the Jews, with fasting, weeping and wailing. Many lay in sackcloth and ashes.
Esther 4:16: ‘Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my attendants will fast as you do. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish.’
Esther 9:31: To establish these days of Purim at their designated times, as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther had decreed for them, and as they had established for themselves and their descendants in regard to their times of fasting and lamentation.
Psalm 35:13: Yet when they were ill, I put on sackcloth and humbled myself with fasting. When my prayers returned to me unanswered,
Psalm 69:10: When I weep and fast, I must endure scorn;
Psalm 109:24: My knees give way from fasting; my body is thin and gaunt.
Isaiah 58:3: “Why have we fasted,” they say, “and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you have not noticed?” ‘Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please and exploit all your workers.
Isaiah 58:4: Your fasting ends in quarrelling and strife, and in striking each other with wicked fists. You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high.
Isaiah 58:5: Is this the kind of fast I have chosen, only a day for people to humble themselves? Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed and for lying in sackcloth and ashes? Is that what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord?
Isaiah 58:6: ‘Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke?
Jeremiah 14:12: Although they fast, I will not listen to their cry; though they offer burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Instead, I will destroy them with the sword, famine and plague.’
Jeremiah 36:6-7: So you go to the house of the Lord on a day of fasting and read to the people from the scroll the words of the Lord that you wrote as I dictated. Read them to all the people of Judah who come in from their towns. [V7] Perhaps they will bring their petition before the Lord and will each turn from their wicked ways, for the anger and wrath pronounced against this people by the Lord are great.’
Jeremiah 36:9: In the ninth month of the fifth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, a time of fasting before the Lord was proclaimed for all the people in Jerusalem and those who had come from the towns of Judah.
Daniel 9:3: So I turned to the Lord God and pleaded with him in prayer and petition, in fasting, and in sackcloth and ashes.
Joel 1:14: Declare a holy fast; call a sacred assembly. Summon the elders and all who live in the land to the house of the Lord your God, and cry out to the Lord.
Joel 2:12: ‘Even now,’ declares the Lord, ‘return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning.’
Joel 2:15: Blow the trumpet in Zion, declare a holy fast, call a sacred assembly.
Jonah 3:5: The Ninevites believed God. A fast was proclaimed, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.
Zechariah 7:3: By asking the priests of the house of the Lord Almighty and the prophets, ‘Should I mourn and fast in the fifth month, as I have done for so many years?’
Zechariah 7:5 ‘Ask all the people of the land and the priests, “When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for the past seventy years, was it really for me that you fasted?
Zechariah 8:19: This is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘The fasts of the fourth, fifth, seventh and tenth months will become joyful and glad occasions and happy festivals for Judah. Therefore love truth and peace.’
Matthew 4:2: After fasting for forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.
Matthew 6:16: ‘When you fast, do not look sombre as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show others they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.
Matthew 6:17: But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face,
Matthew 6:18: So that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen; and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
Matthew 9:14: Then John’s disciples came and asked him, ‘How is it that we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples do not fast?’
Matthew 9:15: Jesus answered, ‘How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; then they will fast.
Mark 2:18: Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. Some people came and asked Jesus, ‘How is it that John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees are fasting, but yours are not?’
Mark 2:19: Jesus answered, ‘How can the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? They cannot, so long as they have him with them.
Mark 2:20: But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them, and on that day they will fast.
Luke 2:37: And then was a widow until she was eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshipped night and day, fasting and praying.
Luke 5:33: They said to him, ‘John’s disciples often fast and pray, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking.’
Luke 5:34: Jesus answered, ‘Can you make the friends of the bridegroom fast while he is with them?
Luke 5:35: But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast.’
Luke 18:12: I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.”
Acts 13:2: While they were worshipping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’
Acts 13:3: So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off.
Acts 14:23: Paul and Barnabas appointed elders for them in each church and, with prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord, in whom they had put their trust.
