For much of Jewish history, the roles of rabbi and cantor were closed to women. Today, women lead congregations, chant sacred music, teach Torah, and guide communities across the Jewish world. That transformation did not happen overnight — it is the story of courageous women who stepped onto the bimah when no one had before, and it is a story in which the Academy for Jewish Religion California (AJRCA) has played an important part.
The First Women to Serve as Rabbi
The modern history of women rabbis begins with Regina Jonas, ordained in Germany in 1935 — the very first woman known to receive rabbinic ordination. She served in Berlin and provided spiritual care, as best she could, to fellow prisoners in the Theresienstadt concentration camp before she was murdered at Auschwitz. Her story was nearly lost to history, and only rediscovered decades later.
It would be another 37 years before Sally Priesand was ordained by Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion in 1972, becoming the first female rabbi in North America. She had entered rabbinical school facing skepticism and open opposition, sustained in part by the support of HUC’s president, Rabbi Nelson Glueck. Two years later, in 1974, Sandy Eisenberg Sasso became the first woman ordained by the Reconstructionist movement, and in 1985, Amy Eilberg became the first female ordained as a Conservative rabbi. Each opened a door that had been closed for generations.
Women and the Cantorate
The cantorate followed a parallel path. In 1975, Barbara Ostfeld became the first female invested as a cantor, breaking a barrier in sacred music much as Priesand had in the rabbinate. In the decades since, women have become some of the most celebrated hazzanim in Jewish life, carrying the melodies and prayers of the tradition to new generations.
That path was not always a formal one. Cantor Perryne Anker, a Cleveland-born soprano who studied on full scholarship at Juilliard, was singing in the choir at Stephen Wise Temple when both the rabbi and the cantor urged Perryne to lead services. This was at a time when no cantorial school on the West Coast would have even considered training and educating her. She went on to serve as the sole cantor of Beth Sholom Temple (now Beth Shir Shalom) in Santa Monica from 1980 to 1992, and later at Temple Shalom for the Arts, building an entire cantorial career on the strength of her voice and her learning rather than a diploma. In 2002, Perryne became Associate Dean of Cantorial Students at the Academy for Jewish Religion California, where she had been teaching since AJRCA’s earliest days. In 2014, it was the Academy that offered Perryne an honorary Master of Jewish Sacred Music and cantorial ordination — recognition, at last, of a calling she had been living for more than three decades.
AJRCA’s Second Milestone: Cantor Jenn Asher
The history of the female cantors again reaches directly into the Academy’s community. Cantor Jenn Asher — an accomplished violinist and musician — became, upon her ordination in 2025 from AJRCA, the first Black woman ordained as a cantor in the United States. Her achievement reflects both a remarkable personal journey as well as the Academy’s commitment to elevating diverse voices in Jewish spiritual leadership.
A Transdenominational Path
The Academy for Jewish Religion California ordains rabbis and cantors through a pluralistic, transdenominational approach that welcomes students of all backgrounds and ages. Rather than training students for a single movement, the Academy prepares clergy to serve the full diversity of Jewish life — Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist, Renewal, and unaffiliated communities alike. For those who feel called to spiritual leadership, the door is open, and the work is as sacred as it has ever been.
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