• Old Testament  =  1,184 pages  =  48% of all scripture
• New Testament  =  403 pages  =  16% of all scripture
• Book of Mormon  =  531 pages  =  21.5% of all scripture
• Doctrine and Covenants  =  295 pages  =  12% of all scripture
• Pearl of Great Price  =  61 pages  =  2.5% of all scripture
• All scripture  =  2,474  pages

Everyone should read the Old Testament clear through.  It is a treasure trove of incomparable stories with which everyone should be familiar.  Reading the Old Testament is not an exercise to be lightly undertaken, but is one that the individual should force himself to complete.  No one is truly educated until he has done it.  Reading the Old Testament, however, will not bring the Spirit into one’s life like reading the other scriptures will do.

The New Testament is a book that should be read again and again.  Nowhere else can a person learn so much about the Savior, His life, His works, and His times.  If one wants to know Jesus he must read the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John in the New Testament, plus the fifth gospel, which is third Nephi in the Book of Mormon.

If one is reading the scriptures to feel the Spirit and to become closer to Jesus Christ, one needs to read the Book of Mormon.  “A man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts,” Joseph Smith said, “than by any other book.”  (Introduction to the Book of Mormon, 6th paragraph).

I have a testimony of that.  That statement is true.  I would recommend the practice of reading daily from the Book of Mormon.

It takes me approximately 2-1/2 minutes to read a page of scripture.  I can easily read 10 pages of scripture in half an hour.  Daily devoting that much time to the Lord is not a sacrifice, and is an investment of time that pays huge dividends.  The person who does that has the Spirit attending him all day.  He thinks good thoughts.  He is strengthened against temptation.  He is imbued with knowledge.  Indeed, he finds great treasures of knowledge that make him kinder, wiser, less selfish, and service-oriented.

All 2,474 pages of the scriptures need to be read once or twice in their entirety, and should be carefully marked.  Thereafter, in my opinion, it is necessary to regularly read only 1,386 of those pages.  Those 1,386 pages can be read each year by reading only four pages per day.  That’s just 10 minutes of reading per day.  Thirty minutes of reading per day gets one through those pages multiple times.

The 1,386 pages of the scriptures that should be read each year include (from the Old Testament) the books of Genesis and Exodus through Exodus chapter 20 (110 pages), the books of Ruth and Esther (15 pages), the book of Isaiah (80 pages), the first half of the book of Daniel (chapters 1-6, 11 pages), and chapters 3 and 4 of Malachi (2 pages).

From the New Testament one should read Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, and James through Revelation (281 pages).  The writings of Paul don’t require an annual reading.

The Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price should be read in their entirety every year.  Something should be read from the Book of Mormon daily while reading the other books.