For whoever it is who shall not deny himself in that same day shall be cut off from his people.
Not to eat or drink on Yom Kippur
The cited verse
The Hebrew (Masoretic Text)
כִּי כָל־הַנֶּפֶשׁ אֲשֶׁר לֹא־תְעֻנֶּה בְּעֶצֶם הַיּוֹם הַזֶּה וְנִכְרְתָה מֵעַמֶּיהָ
In Maimonides’ words
How Maimonides defines this commandment in his Sefer HaMitzvot — his own words, shown as a primary source.
שהזהירנו מאכול בצום כפור, ולא באר בתורה אזהרה לפעל הזה אבל זכר העונש וחייב כרת למי שאכל וידענו שהאכילה מוזהרת ממנו, והוא אמרו כי כל הנפש אשר לא תעונה וגו'. ובתחלת כריתות (דף ב') כשמנו מחוייבי כרת מנו בכללם עונש האוכל ביום הכפורים ובארו שם שכל מה שחייבין עליו כרת הוא מצות לא תעשה חוץ מפסח ומילה. הנה התאמת שהאכילה ביום הכפורים מצות לא תעשה ולפיכך חייבין על זדונה כרת ועל שגגתה חטאת קבועה כמו שבארנו בתחלת כריתות וכמו שהתבאר במסכת הוריות (דף ח') שזה הדין לא יתחייב אלא במצות לא תעשה באמרו במחוייבי חטאת קבועה אחת מכל מצות ה' אשר לא תעשינה. ולשון ספרי כי כל הנפש אשר לא תעונה הרי זה עונש ענוי, אבל אזהרה לענוי עצמו לא שמענו כשהוא אומר עונש מלאכה שאין תלמוד לומר שקל וחומר הוא מה ענוי שאינו נוהג ביום טוב ובשבתות הרי הוא ענוש עליו מלאכה שהיא נוהגת בשבתות ובימים טובים אינו דין שיהיה ענוש עליה אם כן למה נאמר עונש מלאכה ללמוד ממנה אזהרה לענוי מה עונש מלאכה לאחר אזהרה אף עונש ענוי לאחר אזהרה. הנה התבאר מה שאמרנו, וכבר התבארו משפטי מצוה זו במסכת יומא. (אמור, זמנים הלכות שביתת עשור פ"א):
He prohibited us from eating on the fast of Yom Kippur. But the Torah is not explicit about the prohibition of this act. Rather it mentions the punishment and makes one who eats liable for excision, such that we know he is prohibited from eating. And that is His saying, "For any person who will not be afflicted, etc." (Leviticus 23:29). And at the beginning of Keritot (Keritot 2a) when they listed those who are liable for excision, they listed among them, one who eats on Yom Kippur. And they explained there, that everything for which we are liable excision is a negative commandment - except for the Pesach-sacrifice and circumcision. Behold it has been confirmed that eating on Yom Kippur is a negative commandment. And therefore we are liable for excision for its volitional [transgression]; and a fixed sin-offering for its inadvertent [transgression] - as they explained at the beginning of Keritot, and as it is explained in Tractate Horayot (Commentary on the Mishnah on Keritot 2:3-4) - that this law is only mandated for a negative commandment, because of His saying about those that are liable for a fixed sin-offering, "one of the commandments of the Lord [concerning things] which should not be done." (Leviticus 4:13). And the language of the [Sifra] (Sifra, Emor, Chapter 14:4,9) is, "'For any person who will not be afflicted' - this is the punishment for the [non-] affliction. But we have not heard the prohibition about the [non-] affliction [on the day of Yom Kippur] itself! It is when it states the punishment for work. For let it not be stated, since it may be derived a fortiori, viz.: If [non-] affliction, [the ban against which] does not obtain on holidays and Shabbat, is [on Yom Kippur] punishable; then work [the ban against which] does obtain on holidays and Shabbat, how much more so should it be punishable! Why, then, is the punishment for work stated? To derive from it the prohibition against [non-] affliction: Just as the punishment for labor follows a prohibition, so [too] does the punishment for [non-] affliction follow a prohibition." Behold what we have said is explained. And the regulations of this commandment have already been explained in Tractate Yoma. (See Parashat Emor; Mishneh Torah, Rest on the Tenth of Tishrei 1.)
Hebrew: Sefer HaMitzvot, Warsaw 1883 (public domain). English: Sefaria Edition, trans. Rabbi Francis Nataf, 2021 (CC0). Via Sefaria; translator’s footnotes omitted.
Literary form: a command
Applicability
How the catalog describes where and when this commandment applies. These are independent descriptions, not a verdict on which laws still count.
- Recorded as practiced today
Classical halakhic consequences
The consequences the classical halakhah attaches to this commandment, grouped by who imposes them. Where a category has none recorded, that absence is itself meaningful.
Imposed by a court
- Lashes (malkot)
At the hands of Heaven
- Karet — being 'cut off'
Ritual remedy
- A sin-offering (ḥatat)
How the streams of Judaism treat this commandment
The streams of Judaism read the same commandment differently — an ongoing plurality, not a ranking. Each position below is reported as the catalog records it; none is presented as the correct one.
- Orthodox Binding
- Conservative Binding
- Reform Observed
- Reconstructionist Observed
- Karaite Binding
24 of 613 commandments have been examined in depth so far — this one is queued.
How later traditions received this commandment
How later traditions read or reworked this commandment, each attributed to its own voice. The catalog’s own classification of each reception is shown as it records it, never adopted as GEBible’s.
Qumran (the Dead Sea Scrolls)
- 11Q19 (Temple Scroll) 25:10-12 The catalog describes this reception as: reworked
Rabbinic aggadah
- Vayikra Rabbah 30:7 expanded it homiletically
- Pirqei deRabbi Eliezer 46 expanded it homiletically
Philo of Alexandria
- De Specialibus Legibus 1.186-188 rationalized it
Josephus
- Antiquities 3.240-243 affirmed it
- Antiquities 14.66 carried a parallel Pompey's entry on a fast/sabbath day; identification of the day specifically with Yom Kippur is debated in scholarship
The New Testament
- Acts 27:9 carried a parallel 'the Fast' used as a calendrical marker, presupposing the established Yom Kippur fast
The Church Fathers
- Tertullian, De Ieiunio 16 read it spiritually
The Qur'an and hadith
- Sahih al-Bukhari, Kitab al-Sawm (Book of Fasting), ʿAshuraʾ traditions (Muhammad's observance of ʿAshuraʾ identified with the Jewish fast) carried a parallel
Where this commandment meets modern human-rights frameworks
One modern normative lens, attributed to it — not GEBible’s assessment. Each row names the framework it measures against and the catalog’s own classification of the relation.
This framework catalogues tensions; it records agreement in only one of its entries. The near-total tension rate is the shape of the instrument, not a finding.
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general principle
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
Corporal punishment (malkot) for the non-violent, self-regarding act of eating or drinking on a religious fast day conflicts with the general normative principle that individuals retain sovereignty over their own bodily acts and dietary choices.
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Article 7
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
ICCPR Article 7 prohibits cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment; imposing lashes on a person for eating on a designated religious day constitutes degrading treatment under that standard.
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general principle
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
Modern penal proportionality precludes corporal punishment for a non-violent, victimless dietary act; malkot for eating on Yom Kippur exceeds any defensible proportionate sanction for such conduct.
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general principle
This framework classifies the relation as abrogated in practice.
Malkot jurisdiction is held by rabbinic tradition to have lapsed with the dissolution of the ordained Sanhedrin; the de jure norm persists but enforcement has been inoperative since late antiquity.