[pas-ter-uh
l, pah-ster-] 
| 1. | having the simplicity, charm, serenity, or other characteristics generally attributed to rural areas: pastoral scenery; the pastoral life. |
| 2. | pertaining to the country or to life in the country; rural; rustic. |
| 3. | portraying or suggesting idyllically the life of shepherds or of the country, as a work of literature, art, or music: pastoral poetry; a pastoral symphony. |
| 4. | of, pertaining to, or consisting of shepherds. |
| 5. | of or pertaining to a pastor or the duties of a pastor: pastoral visits to a hospital. |
| 6. | used for pasture, as land. |
| 7. | a poem, play, or the like, dealing with the life of shepherds, commonly in a conventional or artificial manner, or with simple rural life generally; a bucolic. |
| 8. | a picture or work of art representing the shepherds' life. |
| 9. | Music. pastorale. |
| 10. | a treatise on the duties of a pastor. |
| 11. | a letter to the people from their spiritual pastor. |
| 12. | a letter to the clergy or people of an ecclesiastical district from its bishop. |
| 13. | Also called pastoral staff. crosier (def. 1). |
| pas·tor·al (pās'tər-əl, pā-stôr'-, -stōr'-) adj.
[Middle English, from Old French, from Latin pāstōrālis, from pāstor, shepherd; see pastor.] pas'tor·al·ly adv. |
A work of art that celebrates the cultivated enjoyment of the countryside. The poem “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love,” by Christopher Marlowe, is a pastoral. Its first stanza reads:
Come live with me, and be my love;
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
Woods or steepy mountain yields.