Wilhelm Abraham Teller

Wilhelm Abraham Teller (9 January 1734 – 9 December 1804) was a German Protestant theologian who championed a rational approach to Christianity.

Teller was born in Leipzig. His father, Romanus Teller (1703–1750), was a pastor at Leipzig, and afterwards became professor of theology in the University. He edited the earlier volumes of a Bibelwerk ("Bible Book", 19 vols, 1749–70) which was designed as an adaptation for German readers of the exegetical works of Andrew Willet, Henry Ainsworth, Symon Patrick, Matthew Poole, Matthew Henry and others. Wilhelm Abraham studied philosophy and theology in the university of his native town. Amongst the men whose influence mainly determined his theological position and line of work was Johann August Ernesti.

Teller's writings present rationalism in its course of development from biblical supernaturalism to the borders of deistical naturalism. His first learned production was a Latin translation of Benjamin Kennicott's Dissertation on the State of the Printed Hebrew Text of the Old Testament (1756), which was followed the next year by an essay in which he expounded his own critical principles.

In 1761 he was appointed pastor, professor of theology and general superintendent in the University of Helmstedt. Here he pursued his exegetical, theological and historical researches, the results of which appeared in his Lehrbuch des christlichen Glaubens ("Textbook of Christian Faith", 1764). This work caused some commotion, as much by the novelty of its method as by the heterodoxy of its matter, and more by its omissions than by its positive teaching, though everywhere the author seeks to put theological doctrines in a decidedly modern form.

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