Trude Weiss-Rosmarin
Encyclopedia
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
-American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
writer, editor, scholar, and feminist
Jewish feminism
Jewish feminism is a movement that seeks to improve the religious, legal, and social status of women within Judaism and to open up new opportunities for religious experience and leadership for Jewish women...
activist. With her husband, she co-founded the School of the Jewish Woman in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
in 1933, and in 1939 founded the Jewish Spectator, a quarterly magazine, which she edited for 50 years.
She was the author of 12 books, including Judaism and Christianity: The differences (1943), Toward Jewish-Muslim Dialogue (1967), and Freedom and Jewish Women (1977).
Early life
Weiss-Rosmarin was born in FrankfurtFrankfurt
Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, the daughter of Jacob and Celestine (Mullings) Weiss. She attended the University of Berlin
Humboldt University of Berlin
The Humboldt University of Berlin is Berlin's oldest university, founded in 1810 as the University of Berlin by the liberal Prussian educational reformer and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt, whose university model has strongly influenced other European and Western universities...
from 1927-8, and the University of Leipzig
University of Leipzig
The University of Leipzig , located in Leipzig in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, is one of the oldest universities in the world and the second-oldest university in Germany...
(1929), before obtaining her PhD in Semitics, philosophy, and archeology in 1931 from the University of Würzburg
University of Würzburg
The University of Würzburg is a university in Würzburg, Germany, founded in 1402. The university is a member of the distinguished Coimbra Group.-Name:...
for a thesis on ancient Arab history. While at university, she became active in Jewish and Zionist
Zionism
Zionism is a Jewish political movement that, in its broadest sense, has supported the self-determination of the Jewish people in a sovereign Jewish national homeland. Since the establishment of the State of Israel, the Zionist movement continues primarily to advocate on behalf of the Jewish state...
organizations. She emigrated in 1931 with her husband, Aaron Rosmarin (born 1904), to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, where they settled in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
. The couple divorced in 1951.
Writing and teaching
Weiss-Rosmarin and her husband opened the School of the Jewish Woman in ManhattanManhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
in October 1933 under the auspices of Hadassah
Hadassah
Hadassah, the Women's Zionist Organization of America is an American Jewish volunteer women's organization. Founded in 1912 by Henrietta Szold, it is one of the largest international Jewish organizations, with around...
, the Women's Zionist Organization of America. The school, which closed in 1939, was modeled on the Frankfurt Lehrhaus created by Franz Rosenzweig
Franz Rosenzweig
Franz Rosenzweig was an influential Jewish theologian and philosopher.-Early life:Franz Rosenzweig was born in Kassel, Germany to a middle-class, minimally observant Jewish family...
and Martin Buber
Martin Buber
Martin Buber was an Austrian-born Jewish philosopher best known for his philosophy of dialogue, a form of religious existentialism centered on the distinction between the I-Thou relationship and the I-It relationship....
, and aimed to combat what Weiss-Rosmarin saw as women's poor access to education. She and her husband offered classes in Torah
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
, Jewish history
Jewish history
Jewish history is the history of the Jews, their religion and culture, as it developed and interacted with other peoples, religions and cultures. Since Jewish history is over 4000 years long and includes hundreds of different populations, any treatment can only be provided in broad strokes...
, Hebrew
Hebrew language
Hebrew is a Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Culturally, is it considered by Jews and other religious groups as the language of the Jewish people, though other Jewish languages had originated among diaspora Jews, and the Hebrew language is also used by non-Jewish groups, such...
, and Yiddish
Yiddish language
Yiddish is a High German language of Ashkenazi Jewish origin, spoken throughout the world. It developed as a fusion of German dialects with Hebrew, Aramaic, Slavic languages and traces of Romance languages...
.
Out of the school's newsletter grew the Jewish Spectator, which described itself as a "typical family magazine with a special appeal to women." By means of her often controversial editorials, Weiss-Rosmarin sought to influence the American-Jewish community, arguing for changes in Jewish family law, Jewish-Arab co-existence in Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, access to a Jewish education for women, and equality for women in the synagogue
Synagogue
A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
and in public life.
Weiss-Rosmarin also wrote a regular column, "Letters from New York", in the London Jewish Chronicle and served as national co-chair of education for the Zionist Organization of America
Zionist Organization of America
The Zionist Organization of America , founded in 1897, was one of the first official Zionist organizations in the United States, and, especially early in the 20th century, the primary representative of Jewish Americans to the World Zionist Organization, espousing primarily Political Zionism.Today,...
. She taught at New York University
New York University
New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...
and the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College
Reconstructionist Rabbinical College
The Reconstructionist Rabbinical College , is located in Wyncote, Pennsylvania, about 10 miles north of central Philadelphia. RRC is the only seminary affiliated with Reconstructionist Judaism. It is accredited by the Commission on Higher Education of the Middle States Association of Colleges and...
, and published books on a variety of subjects. She died of cancer in 1989.
Publications
- Religion of Reason (1936)
- Hebrew Moses: An Answer to Sigmund Freud (1939)
- The Oneg Shabbath Books (1940)
- Highlights of Jewish History (1941)
- Judaism and Christianity: The Differences (1943)
- Jewish Survival (1949)
- Jewish Women Through The Ages (1949)
- What Every Jewish Woman Should Know (1949)
- Saadia (1959)
- Toward Jewish-Muslim Dialogue (1967)
- Jewish Expressions on Jesus: An Anthology (1977)
- Freedom and Jewish Women (1977)
She also wrote a number of articles which appeared in Sh'ma: A Journal of Jewish Responsibility, including:
- The Duty to Do Justice, Vol.11/no.202 1980.
- On Criticizing the Establishment, Vol.1/no.13 1971.
- Buber Repressed What Cohen Had Taught, Vol.4/no.682 1974.
- An End to Separate and Unequal, Vol.1/no.19 1971.
and more.
External links
- Jennifer Breger, Trude Weiss-Rosmarin, Jewish Women Encyclopedia