stated that the rosary helps believers come closer to Christ by contemplating Christ. He stated that the rosary unites us with Mary's own prayer, who, in the presence of God, prays with us and for us. and stated that: "To recite the rosary is nothing other than to contemplate with Mary the face of Christ." Eastern Christianity During the Byzantine Empire, between the 10th and 14th centuries, a tradition of prayer called hesychasm developed, particularly on Mount Athos in Greece, and continues to the present. St. Gregory of Sinai is considered by most to be the founder of the hesychastic approach to prayer. This tradition uses a special posture and breathing rituals, accompanied by the repetition of a short prayer (traditionally the Jesus Prayer) giving rise to suggestions that it may have been influenced by Indian approaches. "While some might compare it [hesychastic prayer] with a mantra, to use the Jesus Prayer in such a fashion is to violate its purpose. One is never to treat it as a string of syllables for which the 'surface' meaning is secondary. Likewise, hollow repetition is considered to be worthless (or even spiritually damaging) in the hesychast tradition." Rather, it is to be in the spirit of a true mantra. This style of prayer was at first opposed as heretical by Barlam in Calabria, but was defended by Saint Gregory Palamas. Coming from hesychia ("stillness, rest, quiet, silence"), hesychasm continues to be practiced in the Eastern Orthodox Church and some other Eastern Churches of the Byzantine Rite. Hesychasm has not gained significance in neither the Western Christian Churches nor the Oriental Christian Churches. In hesychasm, the Jesus prayer, consisting of the phrase: "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me" is repeated either for a set period of time or a set number of times. Hesychasm is contrasted with the more mental or imaginative forms of Christian meditation in which a person is encouraged to imagine or think of events from the life of Jesus or sayings from the Gospel. Sometimes hesychasm has been compared to the meditative techniques of oriental religions and it is possible that there were interactions between Hesychasts and Sufis, but this has not been proven. See Christian meditation music Christian mysticism (contemplation) Daily devotional The Cloud of Unknowing Further reading Notes External links World Community for Christian Meditation Center for Action and Contemplation The Interior Castle