There is a degree of self pride in the repetitions, a 'warm fuzzy' that the mind retreats to as if earning something for repeating the memorized runs while fingering the beads. Moslems do it, too, using their memorized phrases.
Why was David ' a man after God's own heart '? Was it because David would fall into a repetitious chant when approaching The Lord? Or was it because David's heart and mind were always open to the still small voice, not making mental repetitive noise (grey mental sound) with a memorized chant? Neither, it was because David did to a high degree what Abraham did, he believed God.
Mantras and chants are spinning the behavior mechanism upon self ... which is a stealthy source of pride, closing off the soul from spiritual input.
You have a huge clue in your reference to pondering on the things of God all day long. If this leads to falling into chants and repetitive mantras then you are closing the door to the still small voice. If, on the other hand, it leads to joy and peace, and awe of Whom It IS that has brought you into HIS family, well, the difference ought to be obvious.
When Jesus taught us The Lord's Prayer, He was not establishing a mantra to be repeated as if a talisman for protection, He was giving a form for fashioning our prayers, to personalize our praise and our needs in communication with our Heavenly Father, with Him, Jesus, God with us. God honors specific requests and is shut out by mind-numbing repetitions.
In the Old Testament you will find the story of a Prophet who was being hounded by Baal worshipping pagans. This prophet was in need of listening for the still small voice. You will find the story in 1 Kings 19. The mantras and repetitions chanted are like the great wind and the earthquake. Those prevented the Prophet from hearing the still small voice, for GOD was not in the wind and the earthquake.
Read the whole story and see what God tells you in the hearing.
We have no beads; but a LOT of today's 'praise & Worship' songs consist of too many repetitions for me.
With learning and troubleshooting, whenever possible I like to do a “good/bad” comparison to see what and how things are different. It helps me to better understand what I’m looking at.
Do you have any specific examples of vain repetitions that the actual heathens were doing so I can compare? I need more data.
Another thing? In human law, we recognize the concept of “intent”.
I wonder, is it possible whether repetition is vain or not depends upon one’s intent, as much as it does the material one is repeating?
From what little I know of meditation, the intention is to tame self by quieting one’s internal dialogue and all of its static and noise.
Seriously, how can God get in a word edgewise, especially in His still, small voice, if our mind(s) never stops talking, right?
The repetition works to silence one’s inner dialogue by willing it to focus on something specific.
Meditation using Scripture or prayers or even His Name alone are all focusing attention on God or something, aspect, trait, whatever, of God.
To me, using the Rosary as intended, purposes-wise, seems, at minimum, to be an exercise to tame and strengthen one’s will, and the Rosary beads are kinda like using an abacus to count reps, same as while lifting weights or counting laps while running around the track.
So, as someone with a fair amount of gym and dojo time doing various forms of strength and physical training, l tend to understand these repetitive things, not as “vain repetitions as the heathens do”, whatever that is, but are repetitive exercises for spiritual strength training.
I really don’t know. Honestly, I don’t, but that’s how it appears to me, based upon study, observation and personal experience.
Ymmv...