Bind yourselves to your brethren. Those bound together in love bear everything with ease.... If now you want to make the bond double, your brother must also be bound together with you. He wants us to be bound together with one another, not only to be at peace, not only to be friends, but to be all one, a single soul. Beautiful is this bond. With this bond we bind ourselves together both to one another and to God. This is not a chain that bruises. It does not cramp the hands. It leaves them free, gives them ample room and greater courage.

-- St. John Chrysostom, Homily on Ephesians 9.4.1-3

How the Psalter Group Works

Thank you for joining us in praying the Psalms.  May God bless our efforts! 

The Psalter (the Book of Psalms) is traditionally divided into 20 kathismata.  ('Kathismata' is plural for 'kathisma', which means 'sitting'.  With these divisions, you can read through the Book of Psalms in twenty sittings.)  

The goal of the Psalter Group is to read through the entire Psalter every day as a group.  That means that a Psalter Group should really have at least 20 people, so that all 20 kathismata are read each day.  Individually, we are each praying only one kathisma each day.  You may pray your kathisma anytime during the day or night and anywhere you are able.  

On the first day of the fast, each member of the group will pray one kathisma (so that together, we've read the entire Psalter.)  Each day, we will all move on to the next kathisma, and so on.  Once you have prayed Kathisma 20, you will loop over to Kathisma 1 the next day.  

Please note, the Psalm/Kathisma numbering in the document is according to the Septuagint.  If you do not have a Psalter, you may use a Bible.  If you are using a Bible with Masoretic numbering, please see the chart below.  Here is a link to an online Psalter which uses the Septuagint numbering :  http://orthodox.seasidehosting.st/seaside/home

You'll find a page on this blog with the Start Date for each person in the Group, as well as the list of names on a blog post.

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Septaguint --> Masoretic Psalm Numbering Conversion
(Septaguint numbering is for Greek or Orthodox Bibles, Masoretic is for Western Bibles (KJV, etc.)

Septuagint (Greek)
Masoretic
(Hebrew)
1-8
1-8
9
9-10
10-112
Add 1 to the number of each psalm
113
114-115
114
116:1-9
115
116:10-19
116-145
Add 1 to the number of each psalm
146
147:1-11
147
147:12-20
148-150
148-150

The divisions of the psalms into kathismata (each kathisma is further divided into 3 stases) is as follows (using the Septuagint numbering):
Kathisma
Stasis 1 Psalm numbers
Stasis 2 Psalm numbers
Stasis 3 Psalm numbers
I
1-3
4-6
7-8
II
9-10
11-13
14-16
III
17
18-20
21-23
IV
24-26
27-29
30-31
V
32-33
34-35
36
VI
37-39
40-42
43-45
VII
46-48
49-50
51-54
VIII
55-57
58-60
61-63
IX
64-66
67
68-69
X
70-71
72-73
74-76
XI
77
78-80
81-84
XII
85-87
88
89-90
XIII
91-93
94-96
97-100
XIV
101-102
103
104
XV
105
106
107-108
XVI
109-111
112-114
115-117
XVII
118:1-72
118:73-131
118:132-176
XVIII
119-123
124-128
129-133
XIX
134-136
137-139
140-142
XX
143-144
145-147
148-150
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