Since in 1862 Pope Pius IX confirmed his historical cult, and the Martyrologium Romanum, issued by the Holy See in 2004, regards him as a blessed.

Born to Blessed Raingarde in Auvergne, Peter was "dedicated to God" at birth and given to the monastery at Sauxillanges of the Congregation of Cluny where he took his vows at age seventeen.

He produced some of the most important documents of the 12th century, and published the first Latin translation of the Qu'ran which became the standard Benedictine text used by preachers of the Crusades.

[2] His friendship and correspondence with Bishop Henry of Blois of Winchester and Glastonbury, between 1138 and 1142, together with his debating skills, brought wider recognition of his scholarship.

Despite his active life and important role in European history, Peter's greatest achievement is his contribution to the reappraisal of the Church's relations with the religion of Islam.

"[5] George Sale criticized the translation for containing "numberless faults" and "leaving scarce any resemblance" of the Quran.

In his polemic Against the Petrobrusians, which Peter brought to its final form in 1143 soon after his return from Spain, he remarked that "in our day there exist chiefly four different types of sects in the world, i.e., Christians, Jews, Saracens, and pagans .

[7]While his interpretation of Islam was basically negative, it did manage in "setting out a more reasoned approach to Islam…through using its own sources rather than those produced by the hyperactive imagination of some earlier Western Christian writers.

"[8] Although this alternative approach was not widely accepted or emulated by other Christian scholars of the Middle Ages, it did achieve some influence among a limited number of Church figures, including Roger Bacon.