There is nothing more important as a means to raise one's consciousness than the repetition of the right word. It is therefore that we read in the Bible that: "First was the word and the word was God." There is nothing that can be of greater use and importance in the path of spiritual attainment than the repetition of the word. When we look in the traditions we find that from the time of the ancient great Hindu teachers, who lived many thousand years before Christ, the sacred word was in practice. And so you will find in all the great periods when a religious reform came to different countries, that the power of the word was considered to be of immense importance; during the Jewish religion at the time when it was given, and also in the Christian religion when it began.