Rabbis ordained in Germany for first time since WWII
Two Orthodox rabbis ordained in Munich in festive ceremony participants say marked triumph of Judaism on German soil 64 years after Holocaust
Over 60 years after the Holocaust of European Jews, Judaism once against triumphs on German soil: In a ceremony held in Munich on Tuesday, two Jews were ordained as Orthodox rabbis, for the first time since World War II.
The 25-year-old Ukrainian Avraham Radbil and 28-year-old Hungarian Zsolt Balla were handed their certificates at the new synagogue in Munich.
Until now most rabbis serving in Germany had been trained abroad. In 2006 three liberal rabbis were ordained in Dresden.
The students, graduates of the Rabbinic School in Berlin, were ordained in a festive and moving ceremony that was widely covered by the German media.
The event was held by the Central Council of Jews in the country and attended by the German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, World Jewish Congress President Ronald Lauder, President of the Conference of European Rabbis Joseph Sitruk, rabbis from all over the continent, Munich municipality officials and other dignitaries.
The Rabbinic School's President, Rabbi Chanoch HaKohen Ehrentreu, said at the ceremony: "I'm thrilled and elated by the importance of this event. Sixty years after the destruction we ordain as rabbis, here on German soil, nine young yeshiva students who grew up and were educated in German Torah schools, and who will serve at communities in western and eastern Germany and the former Soviet republics.
"We, the rabbis of Europe, have endured the horror and lost our entire families at the hands of the murderers," he added. "And today we return here, to Germany, and proudly praise in the streets of Munich the soul of our nation –the Torah, and its bearers, the scholarly students… who will bequeath it to the next generations."
