2
edits
Changes
no edit summary
A '''reader''', also called a '''lector''' (in Greek, αναγνόστης, anagnostis or anagnostes; in Slavonic, Чтецъ, chtets) is one of the [[minor orders]] of the [[Orthodox Church]], a sub-clerical order to which a man is [[tonsure]]d, setting him apart as blessed by the [[bishop]] to read the [[apostolos|epistle]] readings in the [[Divine Liturgy]]. He may also serve as a [[cantor]], [[catechism|catechist]], or in other leadership roles in the local [[parish]] community.
This order is higher than the [[doorkeeper]] (now largely obsolete) and lower than the [[subdeacon]]. The reader's essential role is to read the Old Testament and Epistle lessons during the Divine Liturgy and other services, as well as to chant the Psalms and the verses of certain [[antiphons]]. There is a special service for the [[tonsure|tonsuring]] of a reader, although in contemporary practice an any layman may receive the priest's blessing to read on a particular occasion. The office of a reader subsumes that of a [[taper-bearer]], and the service of tonsuring a reader mentions both functions.
In the Pre-Nikonian Russian Church, there existed an additional junior grade of reader called ''psalomshchik'' (in Slavonic, Ѱаломщикъ), whose sole function was to read the long [[Kathisma]] Psalms, thus permitting the reader and chanter to save their voices. This office survives in those churches that utilise the Pre-Nikonian Russian ritual: [[Old Believers]] (both [[popovtsy|priested]] and [[priestless]]), those parishes under [[ROCOR]] or the [[Moscow Patriarchate]]. The title of ''psalomshchik'' survives in the later reformed Nikonian Russian rite as an alternative, slightly archaic and quaint name for chanter.