Daily Psalter Reading - First Tuesday

Today's reading: Psalms 7-10

​A look behind the curtain:

The Orthodox Psalter is the prayer book that contains all of the Psalms. It contains all of the same Psalms found in the Old Testament, but divided into a format specifically designed to be used as a prayer book.

The Psalter is divided into twenty kathismata - so-called because one would usually sit during the reading of the Psalter. Each kathisma is divided into three stases - so-called because one would stand at the end of each stasis for "Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit..."

This gives us sixty stases to read over the course of the thirty weekdays between Clean Monday and the beginning of Holy Week. So the reading for each day is two stases of the Psalter.

In an Orthodox church that celebrates daily, non-abridged Orthros and Vespers, the entire Psalter is read every week. Two kathismata are read at every Orthros service, and one kathisma is read at every Vespers service except for Sunday night vespers which has no Psalter readings. During the Great Lent, the Psalter would be read through twice a week in such a church, with additional readings taking place during the Orthros and the daily hours.

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