He served as professor emeritus of history, religion and Middle Eastern and Islamic studies at New York University (NYU).
Peters was born in New York City and graduated from Regis High School in Manhattan in 1945.
He entered the Jesuits that summer and spent four years at their novitiate at St. Andrew on Hudson in Hyde Park, N.Y.
He taught for two years from 1952 to 1954 at Canisius High School in Buffalo, N.Y., and was released from his Jesuit vows in 1954.
He was a visiting professor at a number of other institutions, including several in the Middle East as well as the General Theological Seminary in New York City.