Peripatetic
By Gary L. Fiscus
2023
Peripatetic is defined as “walking or given to walking about.” The word’s origin is attributed to the Hellenic philosopher Aristotle. He preferred to teach his students while walking around with them in whatever environment or setting was available. At his school, established 335 BC, in Athens, Greece he used this peripatetic practice. The technique lasted until the third century B.C. During the Roman Empire’s governing, 27 B.C. - 476 A.D, the peripatetic system of teaching enjoyed a revival. This resurgence would have been also during the time of Jesus and His disciples as they walked around teaching people about the gospel. E. g., Lk. 24:13-15, “And behold, two of them were going that very day to a village named Emmaus, which was threescore furlongs from Jerusalem. And they communed with each other of all these things which had happened. And it came to pass, while they communed and questioned together, that Jesus himself drew near, and went with them.”
As Christians today, we should take advantage of every opportunity to teach peripatetically. It is not imperative that we only teach from the pulpit or the classroom, in the settings around the kitchen table or in the lecture hall. These are all good conditions in which to teach but other environments may be just as good or even better.
We sometimes call this teaching by example, but that arrangement may be inclusive of several things. E.g., the value of face-to-face, eye-to-eye contacts, and voice inflections rather than non-expressive words written on a paper. Conditions may be such that our physical and emotional inclinations are touched or moved. When we sing the hymn, “I Come to the Garden Alone,” what does that conger up in your mind? Are you affected by the lyrics explaining the purpose of being in a garden alone? Do you think of passages like Gen. 3:8 where Moses recorded, “And they [Adam & Eve], heard the voice of Jehovah God walking in the garden in the cool of the day…” In such an aesthetic setting are you passionate about the walk in which you experience the Lord’s presence, the garden, the beauty, the tranquility? Would you do well to be with someone, to share the feelings, to teach and to learn in this peripatetic situation?
In such a setting, likewise, can you sense the Hebrew’s awareness of God as they walked in the wilderness? At Deut. 2:7, “Jehovah…hath blessed thee in all the work of thy hand; he hath known thy walking through this great wilderness: these 40 years Jehovah…hath been with thee; thou hast lacked nothing.” Even with the frequent infidelity of men God has always been at our side awaiting our return. As you walk through the wilderness wanderings of the arid and desolate life on earth, do you even realize that God is available to you? He is walking beside you. How do you think you did all those “works of your hands?” He gave you the abilities and capabilities to succeed.
Some people cannot figure out how they got from point A to point B. It may be that you had a friend or friends that were peripatetically influencing you. Jehovah was walking by your side. It is not like the erroneous poem Footprints in the Sand that suggests He [Jesus] picks you up and saves you; but it is that He works with you and gives you strength for you to overcome your shortcomings and spiritual maladies. You may have had friends in such situations that taught you and encouraged you how to get from issue to issue, from one activity to another, from place to place.
As positive as I am trying to be in these words, I recognize there is also one who walks around with you, (peripatetic) and that is Satan. Job is remembered for his losses, his patience, and his physical and material restorations. At the outset, Job 1:7; 2:2 Satan answered Jehovah’s question with “…from walking up and down in it [earth].” Like Jehovah, Satan is always there. Neither the Lord nor Satan is going to force you into doing something you do not want to do. God has created us with the ability to determine our own destiny. Both Jehovah and Satan will, however, be at your side; God encouraging you to do what is right; Satan lying to you to do what is wrong. You, God, and the Devil form a triangle. The righteous formula is seen in 1 Jn. 1:7-10. An outside factor, Satan, can ruin the purpose of the divine plan of fellowship.
Back to Job’s situation, he was walking with God and the Devil asked the Lord’s permission to walk beside Job. That is peripatetic practice. Again, to 1 John 1 we have the subject of spiritual solidarity addressed. It involves the triangle of God, Christ, and brethren. The fellowship can be annihilated however when we allow darkness rather than light to walk with us. That insertion of sin or allowing the darkness, i.e., devil to walk with us, (i.e., peripatetic), destroys the “friendship” with the Lord and the church. E.G., “Ye adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? Whosoever therefore would be a friend of the world maketh himself an enemy of God.” (Jms. 4:4) Unfaithful children of Jehovah might claim to be “walking with God,” “married to Christ,” but are so much of the world they divorce themselves from their relationship with the Lord.
The prophet Amos, (3:3) recorded the question, “Shall two walk together, except they have agreed?” One cannot walk (peripatetic) serving both “darkness” and “light,” “fidelity,” and “infidelity,” in marriage without their being ramifications and consequences. Would you be happy with a husband or wife who claimed to be married to you and yet committed adultery? You might be forgiving but the incestuous relationship would have to cease on the part of the offender. How must God feel when we claim to be His and yet commit immorality with the world?
The Bible is replete with passages as to the Christian’s walking. E.G., Solomon says there is a contrast between “…servants upon horses, and princes walking like servants…” (Eccl. 10:7). Most of us have experienced situations of injustice. When we feel we have been relegated it is perhaps better to find someone to walk and talk with us, (peripatetic). We can share our sorrows, feelings, emotions and separate ourselves from the distress of discrimination. At the same time we can gain edification, consolation, sympathy and strength to do right.
E.G., Isaiah says the “daughters of Zion” were “…haughty and walked with outstretched necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing, [mincing is defined as acting coquettishly or flirtatiously], as they go…” (Isa. 3:16). I am well aware that there any number of women who are Christians that keep themselves pure, teach younger girls to do the same, and serve as wonderful examples of what a godly woman should be.
It is a shame, however, to see women who are presumed Christians, walk, talk, dress and act like others in the world. It used to be that such behavior was only obvious among the heathens. Today, immorality in dress, speech, and behavior are blatantly apparent even at some worship services. This may be noted with comings and goings to and from the place of service or during the interim between Sunday-Wednesday-Sunday events.
In Titus 2 the apostle Paul said that “older women should teach younger women.” Is there any sense in which this is practiced today? Ladies, do you teach the younger by walking around with them, (peripatetic)? A few women allegedly in the body of Christ curse and swear with the rest of the women in the world. One time a young female of the church told me, “Gary, I finally got that promotion at work but you wouldn’t believe who all I had to sleep with to get there.” Another said she sold tickets at a XXX movie theater “But it’s okay – “I keep my back to the screen.”
Men are much the same if they allow Satan to overwhelm them with the devices available to him. Remember, as mentioned above, he (i.e., Satan), “walked with Job.” I.e., he made himself available to Job for ill counseling. The expressions, “Oh, that’s what all men say,” or “That’s what all men do,” is a dangerous philosophy. It means that whatever opportunities one has taken advantage of to socialize, walk around with (in a peripatetic fashion), or “not choosing our companions wisely,” (1 Cor. 15:33) means that one is influenced by that which is evil. It can happen, and it does!
In your walking about learning and teaching, communicating, and talking with others, i.e., practice being peripatetic, watch for arrogance. Either you or the one you are teaching by such a method can be affected by condescension. Sometimes when one is placed in a teaching position, he/she can allow detrimental behavior to occur. The know-it-all attitude can be fatal to productive outcomes. Such was the case with king Nebuchadnezzar in Dan. 4:29-30, “At the end of twelve months he [Nebuchadnezzar] was walking in the royal palace of Babylon . . . is not this great Babylon, which I have built for the royal dwelling-place, by the might of MY power and for the glory of MY majesty?” He was talking to himself. I.e., “see what I’ve done by MY power!” “A voice from heaven,” (v 31) got his attention. He was so absorbed with himself that even if one, like Daniel, had been around, the king’s words would have no affect – he was too full of himself. Do not let this happen to you or be committed by you when you are practicing Peripatetics!
I always enjoy reading Mark’s account of the blind man of Bethsaida being healed by Jesus, (Mk. 8:22-26). The situation reminds me of a small boy looking up at a tall basketball player. The boy may very well admire him. He sees him as “a tree walking.” We are not told the precision of this miracle by Jesus. I am certain that “men walking like trees,” has reference to the gradual vision of this man and the purpose of the phenomenon performed. Nevertheless, the object lesson I get is again, of the small boy and the prized tall guy. Some of you may remember the TV commercial of 1979. “Mean Joe Greene” was advertising Coca-Cola. The slogan was, “Have a Coke and a Smile.” Nine-year old Okon offered the dejected football player a coke. In turn Greene threw his team jersey to Okon saying, “Hey kid, catch!” The message was clear! That small gesture, those few words, touched both the hearts of Greene and 9-year-old, Okon. It was a form of Peripatetics. Are you enamored with a tall man, a short kid, an opportunity to walk and communicate with either? Again, that is not the meaning of the text of Mk. 8:22-26, but it surely teaches us an exemplary lesson!
Have you ever been so excited that you even in the presence of others leaped up and down, perhaps out of joy? Another of my favorite stories is in Acts 3:8-9 when the lame beggar was healed. “And LEAPING up, he stood, and began to walk…and all the people saw him walking and praising God.” How exciting this must have been! This man had not been able to walk since birth, v 2. Now, all of a sudden, he could put one foot in front of the other! Can you imagine? Some of you can. This was a prophecy of Isaiah some 740 years before Christ was even born. At Isa. 35:1-6 the sixth verse says, “then shall the lame man leap as a hart [deer]…” The Hebrew writer makes specific reference to this scenario in Heb. 12:12-13, “Therefore strengthen the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be dislocated, but rather be healed.” The emphasis here is on the timing of the exercise. Do it while you still can. There is such a thing as waiting too long. That was the case with Esau “…who afterward…was rejected for he found no place for repentance, though he sought it diligently with tears.” Take advantage of your opportunities to apply yourself and teach others at the same time the importance and benefits of “leaping” and “exercising,” in a spiritual sense.
I want to accentuate also that back in the Acts 3 event with the lame man, notice what his peers did and how they reacted. Read on into chapter four. They practiced Peripatetics. Note: “…and all the people saw him…” Can you imagine seeing what they saw? Peripatetics is “teaching when around others,” and certainly that was the case here. God was using this man’s miraculous healing to demonstrate before others Jehovah’s omnipotence. If we look at this positively, can we think that maybe they were leaping with joy for the beggar? Think of the meaning and impact of this word “leaping.” It is used only here in the NT, and “it means in medical language a sudden starting of a bone from the socket, or starting from sleep, or of the sudden bound of the pulse.” (Vincent’s Word Studies). In the next chapter, Acts 4, notice the reaction of the people there as Peter and John continued to perform miracles by the power of God. At vv 21-22, “…for all men glorified God for that which was done. For the man was more than forty years old, on whom this miracle of healing was wrought.” Certainly, the practice of Peripatetics proved to be an expedient method of teaching. People were there as eyewitnesses.
As Christians we need to know just how much people are influenced by our presence with them. We teach by mouth thereby practicing enunciation and pronunciation. We teach by example, as folks are observers of our behavioral practices and patterns.
We need to learn from the following examples, put them into practice and through the peripatetic process influence others by our company with them.
1) At Lk. 1:1-25 we have Zacharias and Elizabeth, the elderly parents of John the immerser. At v 6, “…they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless.” At the 16th v it is prophesied, “And many of the children of Israel shall he turn unto the Lord their God.” Then at v 21 “And the people were waiting for Zacharias, and they marveled while he tarried in the temple.” Through promise, prophecy, and fulfillment these parents made their godly existence known, evidently day by day, by the way they conducted their lives. When something was wrong, in the eyes of the people, i.e., Zacharias “stayed in the temple,” they knew things were not as they should be. They would not have recognized that if Zacharias and Elizabeth’s daily practices had not been familiar to them as the public. Again, the godly couple being around the people taught them the ways of the Lord. It is incumbent on children of God to practice Peripatetics that others “might see our good works and glorify God on this behalf,” (Matt. 5:16).
2) There is something also to be said regarding the churches’ “…fear in the Lord…being multiplied.” (Acts 9:31). There was obviously an association and fellowship among brethren in Judaea, Galilee, and Samaria. The Bible says that they were “walking.” Yes, they could have been walking by themselves, but the inference is that they were practicing Peripatetics, i.e., they mingled and merged in the practice of their faith. This type of being-with-another teaching resulted in a “multiplying” of their spiritual activities.
3) The apostle Paul had been rightly concerned about the sins of the Corinthian Christians, e.g., all of the first epistle addressed to that group. In the second letter he mentions the “renouncing of the hidden things of shame.” The contrast to the Corinthian’s “craftiness,” 2 Cor. 4:2a was the strengthening of everyone’s faith by, again, association. The last clause of v 2 says, “…by the manifestation of the truth commending OURSELVES TO EVERY MAN’S conscience…” The apostle’s direct effect upon each individual child of God in Corinth was positive influence as it was a result of their peripatetic approach.
In Acts 18 we learn of Paul’s second preaching trip. He went to Corinth from Athens, about 45 miles away. He met two other Christians, worked with them in making tents, and reached out to those who would hear the gospel. He did this for about 1 ½ years, constantly being at work in a secular job, (tent-making), as well as preaching the gospel. To be successful, with the Lord working with him, he had to be out-amongst-‘em, i.e., the peripatetic approach.
Lastly, I would suggest again that being in and around people affords the Christian opportunities to teach the word of God by word-of-mouth and by example. Aristotle found this method to be the best for reaching his students. Jesus and the apostles often used the same technique in “going into the whole world and preaching the gospel,” (Mk. 16:15-16).
I re-emphasize that we are not bound only to pulpits and classroom settings. We need to reach out, let others see that we practice what we preach and thereby build faith and confidence in folks who genuinely desire to hear, know, and obey the truth. --GLF