Bea Wyler

Bea Wyler was born in Baden (Switzerland) in 1951, the daughter of a merchant and a housewife. Although she attended Jewish religious classes, her family was not characterized by a distinct Jewish Orthodox way of life. Rituals, such as the lighting of candles for Shabbat, were observed, but food commandments were not given special attention. After graduating from high school, she began studying agronomy at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich, where she gained her first professional experience in the Oldenburg region. After working in the agricultural field for several years, she switched to journalism. She became head of the science section of the Basler Zeitung in 1980. In order to combine her agronomic knowledge with journalism, she eventually took up a position in the public relations department of a Basel-based chemical company.

The Jewish faith had not occupied much space in Bea Wyler's life for a long time. When she finally joined a women's movement in Basel and was also dissatisfied with her previous professional life, she began to reflect. Wyler wanted to learn more about her religion and find out what role it could play in her life. Bea Wyler began to regularly visit the synagogue in Basel and to study the traditions of Judaism. She also traveled to Israel and, upon her return, decided to study in London at Leo Baeck College. Another step during her rabbinic education was to study at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in New York City. She earned a small side income during this time by sewing modern prayer shawls. In 1995, she graduated from New York City and was ordained as a rabbi there. From America, Wyler then went to Oldenburg in Lower Saxony, where she presided over a congregation of about 80 members.

On August 1, 1995, Bea Wyler took office as rabbi in the Jewish communities of Oldenburg and Braunschweig. She is thus the first female rabbi in Germany since the Shoah. On August 7, 1995, Bea Wyler was introduced to her congregations to be served by the two presidents of the Landesverband der Jüdischen Gemeinden in Niedersachsen, Sara-Ruth Schumann and Renate Wagner-Redding. She was officially inducted into her post in December of the same year.

That a woman was in charge of the rabbinical office in a congregation caused incomprehension among many Orthodox Jewish women*Jews throughout Germany. However, Sara-Ruth Schumann, then First Chairwoman of the Oldenburg Jewish Community, commented in a Spiegel interview on the controversy sparked by Bea Wyler's assumption of office as follows: "This is not a conflict. I respect the attitude of Orthodoxy, which has shaped community life in Germany up to now. But it is an enrichment when changes occur. We are taking up a tradition that originated in Germany before World War II" (Schicke 2015). Schumann thus alludes to Regina Jonas, who was the first woman to be ordained in 1935.

Bea Wyler guided her approximately 200 congregation members in Jewish liturgy, Jewish holidays, and related preparations. In addition to her congregational work, Bea Wyler taught in the Jewish Studies program at Carl von Ossietzky University in Oldenburg from 1995 to 1998. In 1997 she became rabbi in the Jewish Community of Delmenhorst, so that she was now responsible for a total of three communities. During the years of her work, the number of members in the three communities doubled. The main reason for this was the immigration from the former Soviet Union. In 2004, she gave up her posts in the Lower Saxon towns and moved back to Switzerland. There she lives with her husband in Wettingen. She continues to teach and publish to this day, but is now retired.