When Fasting Becomes a Weapon: From Gandhi to Shakahola

Fasting has long been seen as a mark of sainthood—a symbol of purity, self-discipline, and devotion. Across centuries and cultures, it has been praised as a spiritual tool for purification or transcendence. In Christianity, saints and mystics fasted to quiet the body and hear God more clearly. In Buddhism, fasting symbolised detachment from earthly cravings. And in Islam, Ramadan continues as one of the most respected and widely observed fasts in the world—a month of reflection, community, and gratitude.

When practiced safely and voluntarily, fasting can indeed offer spiritual and even physical benefits. Short-term fasting can improve insulin sensitivity, support cellular repair processes, and heighten self-awareness. Many people find it brings calm, focus, and a deeper connection to their values.

But context is everything. When fasting is done freely, it’s a spiritual or health practice. When it’s used as leverage, it becomes psychological warfare.

The Moral Power of Hunger

Few figures are more associated with fasting than Mahatma Gandhi. His hunger strikes have been immortalised as heroic acts of conscience—non-violent resistance in its purest form. But Gandhi’s relationship with fasting was not always peaceful or pure.

He fasted not only to protest British rule, but also to influence his own followers, to pressure political opponents, and even to atone for the supposed moral failings of others. When riots broke out or colleagues disagreed with his methods, Gandhi would announce another fast “unto death.”

To his admirers, it was saintly self-sacrifice. To his critics, it was emotional blackmail—a way to enforce obedience through guilt. Who would dare oppose him if their disagreement might be blamed for his death?

Gandhi’s fasts carried enormous psychological weight. They compelled not through violence but through moral pressure. In modern terms, that’s coercive control—a non-physical but deeply manipulative form of domination.

When Fasting Crosses the Line

The idea that hunger can purify or save has had horrific modern consequences. In Shakahola, Kenya, cult leader Paul Mackenzie convinced hundreds of followers to starve themselves to death in the belief that fasting would bring them closer to God. Over 400 people died.

Mackenzie’s actions are now rightly recognised as terrorism—not only because they cost lives, but because they weaponised faith and hunger to control others. His followers’ deaths were not suicides; they were murders by manipulation.

When seen in this light, Gandhi’s use of fasting deserves more critical reflection than history has allowed. Of course, Gandhi did not run a death cult, nor did he order mass starvation. But his use of fasting as political coercion—threatening self-destruction to bend others to his will—shares a psychological lineage with the same tactic: hunger as a means of control.

Voluntary vs. Coerced

The key distinction is consent.

• When fasting is chosen freely—like in Ramadan or a personal health regime—it can be empowering.

• When it’s imposed, demanded, or used to manipulate others’ behaviour, it becomes coercive.

• And when it’s used to create fear or guilt for political gain, it edges into psychological terrorism.

In other words: absence of food is not inherently holy. It’s the meaning and motivation behind it that matter.

Hunger, Power, and the Politics of Purity

Fasting is a form of self-purification, but it easily slips into moral hierarchy—the idea that suffering equals virtue, and that those who do not join in the suffering are somehow impure. Gandhi’s followers saw him as a living saint precisely because he denied himself food and comfort. Yet this dynamic also created a moral economy of guilt and submission, where others felt compelled to conform or risk being seen as spiritually inferior.

That’s how spiritual authority becomes control.

It’s how private devotion becomes public manipulation.

And it’s how the boundary between non-violence and moral violence blurs.

Rethinking the Myth

History loves its saints. But when we strip away the mythology, Gandhi’s fasting looks less like divine protest and more like emotional coercion sanctified by moral charisma. His fasts moved nations—but they also silenced dissent, blurred consent, and reinforced his own moral supremacy.

If coercive control is the use of guilt, fear, or self-sacrifice to dominate others, then Gandhi’s hunger strikes occupy a grey but troubling zone. They invite hard questions:

• When does protest become pressure?

• When does devotion become domination?

And when does a hunger strike become a kind of moral terrorism—forcing others to act through fear of your pain?

Perhaps it’s time we asked those questions not only of modern cults like Shakahola, but of our heroes too. Because the danger was never just in the violence of others—it’s in the ways we sanctify control when it wears the mask of virtue.

Summary & Provocations of When Fasting Becomes a Weapon

• Fasting has been revered across cultures—but its meaning is shaped by context.

• From a health perspective, controlled fasting can have benefits but also risks.

• Gandhi’s fasting was interwoven with his moral politics, and though intended as nonviolent protest, it carried coercive potential, sometimes recognized by himself and his critics.

• The Shakahola massacre reveals the extreme hazard when fasting is weaponised: a technique of control and annihilation.

  
  

Ultimately, when absence of food is voluntary and safe, it is spiritual or healthful. But when fasting becomes a weapon, a tool of domination, it crosses moral lines—perhaps even into terror.

References

ABC News. (2024, August 13). Kenya cult leader on trial for manslaughter over mass deaths. Australian Broadcasting Corporation. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-08-13/kenya-cult-leader-on-trial-for-manslaughter-over-mass-deaths/104220072

Africanews. (2023, May 11). Kenya pastor accused of Shakahola massacre remains in prison. https://www.africanews.com/2023/05/11/kenya-pastor-accused-of-shakahola-massacre-remains-in-prison/

Action Village India. (n.d.). Gandhi’s fasts: The cultural context of fasting and in particular for nonviolent change. https://actionvillageindia.org.uk/unlocked/gandhis-fasts-the-cultural-context-of-fasting-and-in-particular-for-nonviolent-change/

BMJ. (2024). Intermittent fasting: Evidence and uncertainties. BMJ, 389, e082007. https://www.bmj.com/content/389/bmj-2024-082007

CBS News. (2024, June 17). Doomsday cult leader Paul Mackenzie on trial for deaths of hundreds in Kenya’s Shakahola forest massacre. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/doomsday-cult-leader-paul-mackenzie-trial-deaths-hundreds-kenya-shakahola-forest-massacre/

Indian Culture. (n.d.). Fasting for freedom: Gandhi’s fasts as resistance to the British. Government of India. https://indianculture.gov.in/digital-district-repository/district-repository/fasting-freedom-gandhis-fasts-resistance-british

Link Springer. (2022). Gandhi and the political ethics of fasting. In Nonviolence and Religion in South Asia (pp. 85–106). Springer. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-87491-9_5

Mahatma Gandhi Online. (n.d.). My theory of fasting. In The Mind of Mahatma Gandhi (Ch. 6 & 36). https://www.mkgandhi.org/momgandhi/chap06.php

Nature Metabolism. (2024). Weight-independent benefits of intermittent fasting. Nature Metabolism, 6(4), 589–591. https://www.nature.com/articles/s42255-024-01012-z

ScienceDirect. (2023). Effects of intermittent fasting on human metabolism: A review. Nutrition, 111, 112–120. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1555415523003951

ScienceDirect. (2023). Changes in energy expenditure and substrate oxidation during fasting. Metabolism, 146, 155–162. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S026156142300328X

SpringerLink. (2022). Mahatma Gandhi’s political ethics of fasting and coercion. In Nonviolence and Religion in South Asia. Springer. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-87491-9_5

The Lancet eClinicalMedicine. (2024). Umbrella review of intermittent fasting interventions and health outcomes. EClinicalMedicine, 72, 101385. https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370%2824%2900098-1/fulltext

The Star (Kenya). (2025, June 12). Shakahola cult: Mackenzie exploited scriptures to radicalise followers. https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2025-06-12-shakahola-cult-mackenzie-exploited-scriptures-to-radicalise-followers