---
title: "Female Rabbis: From Asenath Barzani and Regina Jonas to Today"
url: "https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/female-rabbis/"
date_published: "2026-10-03T00:26:51+00:00"
date_modified: "2026-10-03T00:26:51+00:00"
author: "Maris Dreshmanis"
language: "en-US"
site: "Reincarnatiopedia (https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/)"
license: "© 2026 Reincarnatiopedia / Maris Dreshmanis. All rights reserved. Cite with a link to the source URL."
---

# Female Rabbis: From Asenath Barzani and Regina Jonas to Today

The first woman formally ordained a rabbi was Regina Jonas, in Germany on 27 December 1935. Long before her, a Kurdish scholar named Asenath Barzani headed a yeshiva in Mosul in the 17th century, and in the 19th century the “Maiden of Ludmir” led a Hasidic following of her own. Today women serve as rabbis in Reform, Reconstructionist and Conservative Judaism, while in Orthodox Judaism the question is still open. This article is part of our guide to [women in religion](https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/women-in-religion/).

## Who was the first female rabbi?

The first woman to receive rabbinic ordination was Regina Jonas (1902–1944) of Berlin. Earlier women taught and led, but she was the first to hold the title of rabbi.

Jonas studied at the Higher Institute for Jewish Studies in Berlin and wrote a thesis on a pointed question: can a woman hold rabbinic office according to Jewish law? Her answer was yes. Most liberal rabbis of the time still refused to ordain her. On 27 December 1935 Rabbi Max Dienemann, head of the Liberal Rabbis’ Association in Offenbach am Main, examined her and ordained her privately. She served Jewish communities in Germany through the worst years of the Nazi regime. In November 1942 she was deported to the Theresienstadt ghetto, where she preached and cared for fellow prisoners for two years, and in 1944 she was murdered in Auschwitz.

For decades her story was almost forgotten. In 1991 the researcher Katharina von Kellenbach found Jonas’s papers in a German archive — her rabbinic diploma, her thesis “Can a Woman Become a Rabbi?” and the only two surviving photographs of her — and the first woman rabbi returned to public memory ([von Kellenbach, 1994](https://doi.org/10.1093/leobaeck/39.1.213)).

Did the Bible already know women who spoke for God? [Meet the female prophets of the Bible →](https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/female-prophets-in-the-bible/)

## Deborah and Huldah: women who led Israel before there were rabbis

The Hebrew Bible names women who judged and prophesied. Deborah is the only woman among the judges of Israel; Huldah was the prophetess the king’s officials consulted in a moment of national crisis.

The Book of Judges calls Deborah a prophetess who “judged Israel” (Judges 4–5): people came to her for decisions, and she summoned the commander Barak to battle. Huldah appears in 2 Kings 22:14–20 and 2 Chronicles 34:22–28: when a scroll of the Law was found in the Temple, King Josiah’s officials went to her to learn what it meant. Neither woman was a rabbi — the rabbinate appeared much later — but both are cited again and again in modern debates about women’s religious authority. We tell their stories in full in [Female Prophets in the Bible](https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/female-prophets-in-the-bible/).

## Asenath Barzani: the Kurdish woman who headed a yeshiva

Asenath Barzani (c. 1590–1670) is often called the first female rabbi, although she was never ordained. She was a scholar of Torah and Kabbalah who led a yeshiva in Mosul in what is now Iraq.

She was born into a family of rabbis in Kurdistan. Her grandfather founded yeshivas in Barzan, Akre, Amedi and Mosul, and her father, Rabbi Samuel Barzani, who had no sons, taught her Torah and Talmud to prepare her as his successor. “I was never taught any work but sacred study,” she later wrote. Her husband, Rabbi Jacob Mizrahi, became head of the Mosul yeshiva after her father, but he was so absorbed in his own studies that Asenath taught the students in his place; after his death the leadership of the yeshiva passed to her. Her letters asking communities to support the yeshiva survive, and in them she describes herself as a teacher of Torah. Kurdish Jewish tradition gives her the title *tanna’it* — a female teacher of the oral law — and tells legends of miracles connected with her name. Her exact dates are approximate, and much of what we know comes from her own letters and later tradition.

She is said to have written the liturgical poem *Ga’agua l’Zion* (“Longing for Zion”), and after her death Kurdish Jews made pilgrimages to her grave in Amedi, where her father is also buried.

Were there women who led in other faiths as well? [Read about women scholars in Islam →](https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/female-imams-women-scholars-in-islam/)

## The Maiden of Ludmir: the only female Hasidic rebbe

Hannah Rachel Verbermacher (1805–1888), known as the Maiden of Ludmir, was the only woman in the history of Hasidism who led a following as an independent rebbe.

She grew up in Ludmir (today Volodymyr in Ukraine), the daughter of a wealthy Hasid. She refused marriage, began to keep commandments that Jewish law does not require of women, and studied Torah intensively. As her reputation grew, people came to her as they came to a rebbe: she received visitors, accepted *kvitlach* (written prayer requests) and taught Torah at the Sabbath table. The pressure against her was strong. After meeting the Maggid of Chernobyl, Rabbi Mordechai Twersky, she stopped her public activity for a time and even married, though how long the marriage lasted is disputed. Late in life she settled in Jerusalem, where a small circle of followers gathered around her again. She died on 1 July 1888 and is buried on the Mount of Olives.

## When did women become rabbis in modern Judaism?

After Regina Jonas, the next ordinations came in the United States: Reform Judaism in 1972, Reconstructionist Judaism in 1974 and Conservative Judaism in 1985.

| Movement | First woman rabbi | Year |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Liberal (Germany) | Regina Jonas, private ordination by Rabbi Max Dienemann | 1935 |
| Reform (USA) | Sally Priesand, Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion, Cincinnati | 3 June 1972 |
| Reconstructionist (USA) | Sandy Eisenberg Sasso, Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, Philadelphia | 19 May 1974 |
| Conservative (USA) | Amy Eilberg, Jewish Theological Seminary of America | 1985 |
| Open Orthodox (USA) | Sara Hurwitz, title “Maharat” | 2009 |

Sally Priesand later described her decision to become a rabbi as “an affirmation of my belief in God, in the worth of each individual, and in Judaism as a way of life.” Her ordination opened the door for hundreds of women rabbis in the decades that followed.

## Can a woman be a rabbi in Orthodox Judaism?

Mainstream Orthodox Judaism does not ordain women as rabbis. A small “Open Orthodox” movement has ordained women since 2009, under titles such as Maharat and Rabba.

In Orthodox communities a woman is not counted in the *minyan*, the quorum of ten needed for public prayer, and does not serve as a judge in a rabbinic court. In 2009 Rabbi Avi Weiss and Rabbi Daniel Sperber publicly gave Sara Hurwitz the title Maharat, and Weiss and Hurwitz founded Yeshivat Maharat to train Orthodox women as spiritual leaders. Hurwitz later took the title Rabba and serves at the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale in New York. Most Orthodox rabbinic bodies do not accept these ordinations, so the debate continues.

How do other faiths answer the same question? [See whether women can be priests in Christianity →](https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/can-women-be-priests/)

## What does Kabbalah say about women’s souls and reincarnation?

Jewish mysticism teaches *gilgul*, the return of the soul in a new life. In the school of Rabbi Isaac Luria, the woman’s soul was described as taking part in this cycle differently from the man’s.

The book *Sha’ar HaGilgulim* (“Gate of Reincarnations”), written down by Luria’s disciple Hayyim Vital in 16th-century Safed, explains why souls come back: to repair a wrong, to complete a commandment left undone, to help others. It also teaches that when a man returns to repair his soul, his wife may return with him, even if she herself needs no repair. Vital is also reported to have held that women’s souls did not undergo gilgul as men’s souls did — one reason why, in Jewish folklore, the restless spirit called a *dybbuk* was almost always male. These views belong to one mystical school, and Jewish thinkers have argued about reincarnation for a thousand years. Our overview of [reincarnation beliefs across world religions](https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/reincarnation-beliefs-across-world-religions-and-cultures/) places gilgul next to the teachings of Hindus, Buddhists, Druze and the Yoruba.

Could a soul choose to be born a woman? Life-between-lives research offers its own answer: [read about Michael Newton’s *Destiny of Souls* →](https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/destiny-of-souls-book/)

## Frequently asked questions

### Who was the first female rabbi in history?

Regina Jonas, ordained in Germany on 27 December 1935. Asenath Barzani (17th century) is often called the first, but she taught and led a yeshiva without formal ordination.

### Who was the first female rabbi in America?

Sally Priesand, ordained by Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati on 3 June 1972.

### Are there female rabbis in Orthodox Judaism?

Not in mainstream Orthodoxy. A small Open Orthodox movement has ordained women since 2009 under the titles Maharat and Rabba.

### Was Deborah a rabbi?

No. Deborah was a prophetess and judge in biblical Israel, long before the rabbinate existed, but her example is often cited in debates about women’s religious leadership.

### Who was the Maiden of Ludmir?

Hannah Rachel Verbermacher (1805–1888), the only woman who led a Hasidic following as an independent rebbe. She died in Jerusalem.

## Sources

1. Elisa Klapheck. *Fräulein Rabbiner Jonas: The Story of the First Woman Rabbi*. Jossey-Bass, 2004.
2. Jewish Women’s Archive. Encyclopedia entries “Regina Jonas”, “Sally Priesand”, “Asenath Barzani”. jwa.org.
3. Nathaniel Deutsch. *The Maiden of Ludmir: A Jewish Holy Woman and Her World*. University of California Press, 2003.
4. Uri Melammed and Renée Levine Melammed. “Rabbi Asnat: A Female Yeshiva Director in Kurdistan.” *Pe’amim* 82 (2000), pp. 163–178 (Hebrew).
5. Hayyim Vital. *Sha’ar HaGilgulim* (Gate of Reincarnations), 16th century.
6. Judges 4–5; 2 Kings 22:14–20; 2 Chronicles 34:22–28.
7. Katharina von Kellenbach. ““God Does Not Oppress Any Human Being”: The Life and Thought of Rabbi Regina Jonas”. *Leo Baeck Institute Year Book* 39(1), 1994, 213–225. doi:[10.1093/leobaeck/39.1.213](https://doi.org/10.1093/leobaeck/39.1.213)
8. Stefanie Sinclair. “Regina Jonas: Forgetting and Remembering the First Female Rabbi”. *Religion* 43(4), 2013, 541–563. doi:[10.1080/0048721x.2013.789090](https://doi.org/10.1080/0048721x.2013.789090)
9. Sarah Wobick-Segev. “The Text and Context of Regina Jonas’s Halakhic Work ‘Kann die Frau das rabbinische Amt bekleiden?’”. *Journal of Modern Jewish Studies* 23(2), 2024, 305–326. doi:[10.1080/14725886.2023.2208526](https://doi.org/10.1080/14725886.2023.2208526)

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Source: [Female Rabbis: From Asenath Barzani and Regina Jonas to Today](https://reincarnatiopedia.com/en/female-rabbis/) — Reincarnatiopedia, Maris Dreshmanis. License: © 2026 Reincarnatiopedia / Maris Dreshmanis. All rights reserved. Cite with a link to the source URL.