The melodies of chants create a repetition of beauty, a recapitulation of the sacred that fills the deep places in the heart's longing for spiritual union. . . . Melody in the form of spiritual chanting reverberates with gratitude, joy, and prayer, drawing us into the heart and our connection with the Divine.

-- Christine Stevens
(Music Medicine)

Chanting is an integral part of all the world's religious traditions -- Buddhist, Jewish, Hindu, Islamic, and others.  At a certain pitch of religious experience, the heart just want to sing; it breaks into song.

-- Brother David Steindl-Rast
(The Music in Silence)

First Born, the Grandfathers told, had emerged from quivering mud to the rhythm of his own heart, and so man had known the true rhythm from the beginning.  Soon afterwards, man had learned to use this rhythm for making songs.  And then certain ones had discovered the true power in song; the power for making spiritual contact.

-- Ruth Beebe Hill
(Hanta Yo)

There is a temple in heaven
That is only opened through song.

-- Rabbi Pinchas of Koretz
(translated by A. B. Birnbaum)