"Pastoral" has, as Mary in Kentucky just hinted, to do rather with shepherds than with sheep as such. If it were about sheep it would be called ovine music. The word pastoral is, rather obviously, an elaboration of the word pastor, as in parson; meaning, of course, precisely that: "shepherd". And the Bonus Pastor, or Good Shepherd, in much musical literature is Jesus, seen as prefigured in the Shepherd of Psalm 23[22].

Liland