From the calendar, 2027.

Monday, January 18

Ss Athanasius the Great and Cyril of Alexandria

Fast-free

Appointed to be read.

At the
1. EpistleHebrews 3:5–11, 17–19
2. GospelLuke 20:27–44

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Epistle.

Hebrews 3:5–11, 17–19

1 min read

5And Moses indeed was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which would be spoken afterward,

6but Christ as a Son over His own house, whose house we are if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm to the end.

7Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says: 'Today, if you will hear His voice,

8Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, In the day of trial in the wilderness,

9Where your fathers tested Me, tried Me, And saw My works forty years.

10Therefore I was angry with that generation, And said, 'They always go astray in their heart, And they have not known My ways.'

11So I swore in My wrath,

17Now with whom was He angry forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness?

18And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey?

19So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

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Gospel.

Luke 20:27–44

2 min read

27Then some of the Sadducees, who deny that there is a resurrection, came to Him and asked Him,

28saying: 'Teacher, Moses wrote to us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife, and he dies without children, his brother should take his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.

29Now there were seven brothers. And the first took a wife, and died without children.

30And the second took her as wife, and he died childless.

31Then the third took her, and in like manner the seven also; and they left no children, and died.

32Last of all the woman died also.

33Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife does she become? For all seven had her as wife.'

34Jesus answered and said to them, 'The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage.

35But those who are counted worthy to attain that age, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage;

36nor can they die anymore, for they are equal to the angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection.

37But even Moses showed in the burning bush passage that the dead are raised, when he called the Lord 'the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.'

38For He is not the God of the dead but of the living, for all live to Him.'

39Then some of the scribes answered and said, 'Teacher, You have spoken well.'

40But after that they dared not question Him anymore.

41And He said to them, 'How can they say that the Christ is the Son of David?

42Now David himself said in the Book of Psalms: 'The Lord said to my Lord, 'Sit at My right hand,

43Till I make Your enemies Your footstool.' '

44Therefore David calls Him 'Lord'; how is He then his Son?'

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In remembrance.

Ss Athanasius the Great and Cyril of AlexandriaRead the life

Saint Athanasius, pillar of Orthodoxy and Father of the Church, was born in Alexandria in 275, to pious Christian parents. Even as a child, his piety and devotion to the Faith were so notable that Alexander, the Patriarch of the city, took Athanasius under his protection. As a student, he acquired a thorough education, but was more interested in the things of God than in secular learning, and withdrew for a time into the desert to sit at the feet of Saint Anthony (January 17), whose disciple he became and whose biography he later wrote. On returning to Alexandria, he was ordained to the diaconate and began his public labors for the Church. He wrote his treatise On the Incarnation, when he was only twenty. (It contains a phrase, still often quoted today, that express in a few words some of the depths of the Mystery of the Incarnation: God became man that man might become god.)

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What this is.

The Scripture the Orthodox Church reads each day, the saints it remembers, and a study aid that answers from Scripture and the Fathers and shows its sources.

Divine Liturgy. The Church's main service, at which Holy Communion is given. Its Epistle and Gospel are what most people mean by the day's readings.

Matins. The morning service of praise. On Sundays and feasts it has a Gospel of its own.

Vespers. The evening service. The Church's day begins at sunset, so a feast's Vespers is served the evening before.

Hours. Short services of psalms and prayer at set times of the day: the First, Third, Sixth and Ninth Hours.

Tone. The hymns of the week are sung in one of eight tones, or melodies, which follow each other week by week.

New Calendar. Fixed feasts are kept on the civil date, as in the OCA and the Antiochian Archdiocese. Churches on the Old Calendar keep them 13 days later. Pascha is the same for both.