The very earliest Christians would have laughed in your face if you told them they had to fast for forty days during the period of Lent. Jesus would have kicked you up the arse for being an idiot if you'd told him that story. The whole thing is total codswallop!
For a start, the early Christians never celebrated Lent. There is nothing in the bible about it so they never even bothered.
It wasn't until 150 years after the death of Jesus that Irenaeus first mentioned the practice in a letter to Pope Victor I. He said,
"Some think that they ought to fast for one day, some for two, others for still more; some make their 'day' last 40 hours on end." (Eusebius, History of the Church, V, 24).
Then, about 200 years after that (nearly four centuries after the death of Jesus) Rufinus translated the letter from Greek into Latin and changed the '40 hours' into '40 days'. In other words, the whole thing was a mistake!
Details here:
http://www.catholiceducation.org/en/culture/
So we've just had the Catholic Education Resource Center tell us quite clearly that the 40 day fast of Lent has no biblical precedent and it is based solely upon an error in translation that occurred four centuries after Jesus had died.
But look what happens at the Catholic Answers website when the staff are talking to gullible parishioners who know absolutely nothing about the history of their religion. The 'Answers Staff' simply go back to the Old and New Testaments and retrospectively choose unrelated texts which they reinterpret as instructions about Lent. Every word of their answer is complete nonsense as far as Lent is concerned! Here's what they say:
The reason Lent lasts 40 days is that 40 is the traditional number of judgment and spiritual testing in the Bible (Gn 7:4, Ex 24:18, 34:28, Nm 13:25, 14:33, Jon 3:4). Lent bears particular relationship to the 40 days Christ spent fasting in the desert before entering into his public ministry (Mt 4:1-11). Catholics imitate Christ by spending 40 days in spiritual discipline before the celebration of Christ's triumph over sin and death.
Fasting is a biblical discipline that can be defended from both the Old and the New Testament. Christ expected his disciples to fast (Mt 9:14-15) and issued instructions for how they should do so (Mt 6:16-18). Catholics follow this pattern by holding a partial fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.
Abstinence from certain foods is also a biblical discipline. In Daniel 10:2-3 we read, "In those days I, Daniel, was mourning for three weeks. I ate no delicacies, no meat or wine entered my mouth, nor did I anoint myself at all, for the full three weeks." Catholics use a practice similar to Daniel's when, as a way of commemorating Christ's Crucifixion on a Friday, they abstain from eating meat on that day of the week during Lent. The only kind of flesh they eat on Friday is fish, which is a symbol of Christ.
http://www.catholic.com/quickquestions/
Christians telling lies for Jesus. What a surprise.
