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Here is an excerpt from an article, entitled "The Role of Sound in Meditation", 

which I

thought might interest people:



"...Why do we use sound in meditation? Why not use one of the other senses or

faculties, since touch, sight, taste, and smell must also possess increasingly

subtler

forms until they reach the point of their emerging? It is true that these four

faculties

do have subtle forms, but only sound reaches to the ultimate point of emergence.



The five senses correspond to the five elements of which all things consist.

Those

elements are ether, air, fire, water, and earth. That is, their grossest forms

are those

of sound, sight, touch, taste, and smell as perceived by the bodily senses.

Because of

this we use these terms to refer to them. But the water element is not just the

liquid

we call "water." It is much, much more, having roots into the astral and causal

planes.

The same is true of the other elements.



When relative existence, individual or cosmic, begins, there is a chain of

manifestation. First there is the out-turning of the consciousness itself. This

modification on the cosmic level is the emerging of the Mahat Tattwa, the Great

Element, that is the Personal or Saguna Brahman, spoken of in Christianity as

"the

Only-begotten of the Father" or "Son" of God. In the individual this is the

sense of

asmita : I-am-ness. Then the Pradhana [Prakriti] modifies itself into the five

elements,

beginning with the ether, and each succeeding element contains within itself

some of

the preceding elements. That is, air is not "pure" but is air mixed with some

ether.

Fire possesses some of the ether and air element. Water has some fire, air, and

ether.

Earth has some water, fire, air, and ether. So only ether is unmixed, and only

ether is

"touching" the principle of individualized consciousness. In other words, only

ether is

in direct contact with the spirit. Yet ether [akasha] pervades all the other

elements as

their prime constituent–actually as their source and core element. Sound is the

quality

(or faculty) of ether;  touch is the quality of air; sight is the quality of

fire; taste is the

quality of water; and smell is the quality of earth. Sound, then, is the only

thing that

reaches back to the principle of consciousness. The other elements stop

somewhere

along the way.



The five elements also correspond to the five levels or bodies known as koshas:

the

anandamaya, jnanamaya, manomaya, pranamaya, and annamaya bodies. These are

the intelligence, intellectual, mental (sensory), biomagnetic, and physical

bodies. The

highest (most subtle) body is the etheric body (anandamaya kosha) which is the

seat

of sound or speech.



Sound, then, is the direct means to return our awareness to the inmost level of

our

being and put us into touch with consciousness itself. In fact, consciousness is

innate

in sound. At the same time, sound rules all the levels of our being and has the

ability

to..."



To read more, go to: http://www.atmajyoti.org/me_role_of_sound_meditation.asp



Sorry for the teaser, but the entire article is to long for a forum.



Happy New Year!