Benjamin R. Merkle

From their decades of combined teaching experience, Benjamin L. Merkle and Robert L. Plummer have produced an ideal resource for novice Greek students to not only learn the language but also kindle a passion for reading the Greek New Testament. Designed for those new to Greek, Beginning with New Testament Greek is a user-friendly textbook for elementary Greek courses at the college or seminary level.

This study begins with an examination of Girolamo Zanchi's De Tribus Elohim (1572), setting this important defense of the doctrine of the Trinity in the immediate context of the recent rise of antitrinitarianism within the Reformed Palatinate. De Tribus Elohim focused on the grammatical peculiarity of the Hebrew word Elohim (God) in order to refute the biblicism of its contemporary antitrinitarians. In doing so, Zanchi's argument followed an exegetical thread common within the late medieval case for the doctrine of the Trinity, but which ran contrary to the exegetical sensibilities of many of Zanchi's own Reformed colleagues. This disagreement over the correct interpretation of the word Elohim, then became a touchstone for distinguishing between two different approaches to the Hebrew text with the Reformed Church of the late sixteenth century, and becomes a significant piece in understanding the development of Reformed exegesis.