The Living Tradition An Orthodox Archive of the Church Fathers and Early Church

Orthodox worship and spiritual life — lesson 1

The daily cycle of prayer

Vespers, Compline, Midnight Office, Matins and the Hours, and why the Church's day begins in the evening.

  • Liturgical witnessAttested in the Church's worship — in a hymn, a prayer, a rite or a commemoration. Liturgical language is theological rather than casual, but a hymn is not a canon.
  • Jurisdiction-specific practicePractice varies legitimately between canonical Orthodox jurisdictions. Variation in practice is not variation in faith.

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What this lesson covers

  • Name the services of the daily cycle in order.
  • Explain why the liturgical day begins at sunset.
  • Describe how the cycles interlock.

About 7 minutes to read.

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The Orthodox liturgical day begins in the evening. Vespers is the first service of the day that follows, not the last of the day that has ended — which is why the Saturday evening service belongs to Sunday, and why Genesis is read at the start of it: there was evening and there was morning, one day.

The full daily cycle runs Vespers, Compline, the Midnight Office, Matins or Orthros, and the First, Third, Sixth and Ninth Hours. The Divine Liturgy is not part of this cycle; it is the act into which the cycle opens.

Three cycles at once

The daily cycle
The services above, keyed to the hours.
The weekly cycle
Eight tones rotating through the weeks, with each day of the week carrying its own commemoration — Sunday the resurrection, Wednesday and Friday the Cross.
The yearly cycles
The fixed calendar of feasts and saints, and the movable cycle around pascha that governs Lent, Pascha and Pentecost.

Any given service combines material from all three, which is why Orthodox liturgical books are complicated and why a parish typically serves an abbreviated form.

The Psalter runs through all of it. Divided into twenty sections, it is appointed to be read through each week, and twice weekly in Lent. More of Orthodox worship is Psalms than is anything else.

Key Scripture

  • Genesis 1:5 — Evening and morning, one day — read at Vespers.
  • Psalm 141 — The evening psalm at Vespers: let my prayer arise as incense.
  • Acts 3:1 — Peter and John going up at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour.

On Scripture references. References are given so you can read the passage in the translation your parish uses. This site does not reproduce a modern copyrighted Bible text.

Council and canon connections

  • Canon XX of Nicaea legislates the posture of prayer on Sundays and through the season of Pentecost.

Why this matters in lived Orthodoxy

An inquirer attending Vespers on a Saturday evening is attending the beginning of Sunday, not an optional extra before it. Many people find Vespers a gentler first visit than the Liturgy: it is shorter, quieter, and asks nothing of a visitor.

Review

When does the Orthodox liturgical day begin?
At sunset, with Vespers, so the Saturday evening service belongs to Sunday.
What are the three interlocking cycles?
The daily cycle of services, the weekly cycle of eight tones and daily commemorations, and the yearly fixed and movable cycles.

Your notes

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Going deeper

Sources for this page

  1. Tier C The Seven Ecumenical Councils of the Undivided Church Henry R. Percival (ed.); Philip Schaff and Henry Wace (series eds.) The Canons of the 318 Holy Fathers, Canon XX annotated edition of conciliar texts Source record
  2. Tier C The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson (eds.); A. Cleveland Coxe (American ed.) The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, Chapter VIII translated edition of primary texts Fixed hours of prayer in the earliest period. Source record

Tiers are explained in the methodology. No page on this site has been reviewed or approved by any bishop, priest, synod or seminary.