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Henry David Thoreau Walking Meaning

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What is walking? Is it an aimless way to waste time with no real destination? Do we as humans walk with a purpose or with somewhere to be? In Henry David Thoreau’s piece, Walking, he discusses the beauty of nature and how we as humans are “an inhabitant of nature, rather than a member of society. (Pg. 49)” Thoreau discloses how we as a society never are able to just get out and walk anymore. We spend so much of our lives with places to be and things to do that we never have time to walk around in nature, appreciate the beautiful things we have or spend time in our faith life with Christ. Thoreau says, “I have met with but one or two persons in the course of my life who actually understood the art of walking. (Pg. 49)” He explains how the villagers and people are so busy walking on these man made “roads” coming and going that basically they fail to recognize the beauty and grace of the …show more content…
Episcopalian theologian William J. Wolf believes that Thoreau was fundamentally a Christian making him very capable of involving faith in his writings. Thoreau talks about components like “Prince of Darkness (Pg. 53)” and “the Holy Land (Pg. 60).” Not only does Thoreau mention the Holy Land “shinning ever so brightly”, he even goes on to talking about “going forth and reconquering the Holy Land (Pg. 49, 74).” This could mean that Thoreau is not only telling us to take time and enjoy the beauty of nature around us, but also to take the time to walk and talk with God in our daily lives. To go forth and reconquer or re-ignite our faith with God. This is where we as Christians sometimes fall short. We devote so much of our time to earthy problems, possessions and people that we forget to leave time to further our faith walk with God. However, God knows we will never be perfect; the only thing we can do is try and give it our

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