Vedic chanting

Attended a 'vedic chanting' special meeting today that was intended to raise awareness on the advantages of vedic chanting. Some truly wonderful singers sang some, possibly profoundly meaningful, chants in enchanting voices. Only thing I could understand was the oft repeated beautiful phrase 'Viswam naaraayanam' meaning 'the universe is the eternal being Narayana'. Sanskrit slokas, when chanted properly (as was done today), do have a certain unfathomable depth in them! That depth brings along a lot of silence, albeit short lived, in the listener.

Senior people who organized the show waxed eloquent on the importance of vedic chanting and the advantages to be accrued due to it. This, usually, is my bone of contention with them. Such calculated gambles of doing a certain act of 'devotion' in order to gain some benefits is still totally within the realm of the ego. I see a bunch of peripheral benefits in chanting in the form of the silence it brings in one. But, why should one really worry about these things when there are so many direct things to be done that bring in so much more spiritual advancement. Why don't we instead try and rid ourselves of our conditioned fears and desires? May be the chants have more use for someone who is 'twice born' (first birth = coming out of moms womb; second birth = coming out of the grasp of ego induced fears and desires). But for those who are still caught in fears and desires, what good would this chanting do? A mouse does not become wise by staying inside a room where all the vedas are being chanted.

The only thing all the speakers harped upon constantly was about all the info one might accrue by reading and chanting vedas. I would bet that most people who took the pains to write the vedas did not have this in mind when they wrote it. Theyd rather have a transformation in the listener than it being a simple addition to his/her memory!