Just two years later, in 1924 Regina Jonas (1902-1944) registered as a student at the Hochschule fiir die Wissenschaft des Judentums in Berlin . Other women also studied there and in 1930, 27 of the 155 students were female, but only Jonas aspired to the rabbinate. In 1930 she completed her studies along with a halakhic thesis on the topic“Can a Woman Become a Rabbi?” She did not receive ordination as the ordaining professor of Tal mud , Eduard Baneth , had just died and his successor , Chanoch Albeck , opposed her ordination. She was, finally ordained by Max Dienemann at the end of 1935. She was readily accepted by her liberal colleagues and through her earnest service, partially by others. The Orthodox opposed the ordination, but did not engage in a halakhic discussion. Jonas had opportunities to emigrate, but refused and was killed in Auschwitz in 1944.4
When the Hebrew Union College ordained its first woman student, Sally Priesand, in 1973, it was without halakhic debate. She and hundreds of others began to serve the Jewish community. No halakhic justification was sought and, as with some other North American changes, there was no official resolution, either. When the Conservative movement took the same step some years later, it engaged in a lengthy halakhic discussion that sought to justify the ordination on traditional grounds.
During the last forty years Reform Judaism has willingly joined the feminist movement, but it cannot claim to have led it. Complete equality in congregational leadership had existed in some places but now came more quickly everywhere. The ordination of Sally Priesand and several hundred other women subsequently opened the rabbinate and the cantorate fully to women. The synagogue liturgy has slowly changed to avoid all references to sex. Feminist liturgies have been created as have midrashim that emphasize the role of women. Although Reform Judaism has not been a leader in the broader field of feminism, it has led within Judaism and been a catalyst that has moved even the Orthodox community to some radical changes. So, for example, women halakhists are now trained in Israel ; they will not function on a bet