“Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high.”
The rhetorical question—"Is not this the fast I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice?"—immediately inverts the people's assumption by redefining fasting from ritual to justice-practice. The phrase "loose the bonds of injustice, undo the thongs of the yoke" uses emancipatory language, invoking Jubilee rhetoric and directing religious discipline toward liberation of the oppressed. The mention of fasting while quarreling and striking the vulnerable with wicked fist exposes the moral obscenity of ritual practice paired with social violence. This verse's force derives from its direct prohibition: fasting undertaken while maintaining injustice is not merely ineffective but blasphemous.
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