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Ada Maimon (Fishman)

One of the “spiritual mothers” of Jewish feminism in Israel, Ada Maimon founded the women's labor organization, Mo'ezet Ha-Po'a lot, and served in the first Knesset. In each of her many positions, she viewed her role as being a religious and spiritual one.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/maimon-fishman-ada

Minnie Dessau Louis

Minnie Dessau Louis was an essayist, journalist, and poet, but she is best known for her philanthropic work in the Jewish community, largely focusing on women and children. She devoted her life to teaching immigrant Jewish women multiple skills through the many and varied schools she ran and her involvement in the founding of the Hebrew Technical School for Girls and the National Council of Jewish Women.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/louis-minnie-dessau

Rebecca Pearl Lovenstein

In 1920, Rebecca Pearl Lovenstein became the first woman lawyer allowed to practice in Virginia. She went on to create a state bar association for women.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lovenstein-rebecca-pearl

Johanna Löwenherz

Johanna Löwenherz traveled widely on behalf of Germany’s socialist women’s movement, raising consciousness and lecturing on the social, economic, and legal equality of women. She became one of the most active representatives of the SDP in the Neuwied region, elected as a delegate to three regional party conferences.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lowenherz-johanna

Esther Lowenthal

Esther Lowenthal’s long career teaching economics at Smith explored subjects from government spending and taxation to the theories of socialist economists.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lowenthal-esther

Zivia Lubetkin

Zivia Lubetkin was an important member of the underground resistance movement in Poland during World War II, and later an active member of the United Kibbutz Movement in Palestine.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lubetkin-zivia

Ludomir, Maid of

A series of traumatic events motivated the Maid of Ludmir to begin practicing male ritual Hasidic observances as a young adult, and she became renowned for her miracle-granting abilities. Although she was able to hold a position of religious power in the Hasidic community without the help of powerful Hasidic men in her family, her story ultimately upholds gender expectations.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/ludomir-maid-of

A symetrical pattern of vines, with six bunches of grapes and leaves drooping down from the top of the book cover, above the title and author

Adeline Cohnfeldt Lust

Adeline Cohnfeldt Lust was a writer who published two novels and numerous short stories, newspapers articles, and editorials over her trailblazing career as a Jewish woman in journalism in the early twentieth century.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lust-adeline-cohnfeldt

Rosa Luxemburg

Rosa Luxemburg was a socialist revolutionary known for her critical perspective. Born in Poland, Luxemburg had become an important figure in the world socialist movement by 1913. She argued against Lenin’s hierarchal conception of party organization, and against revisionism. Luxemburg was internationalist in orientation and unflinchingly dedicated to a radical democratic vision.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/luxemburg-rosa

Maacah 4: Midrash and Aggadah

The Midrash and Aggadah regarding Maacah, daughter of Abishalom, who worshiped an idol, focuses mostly on her pagan worship of Asherah.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/maacah-4-midrash-and-aggadah

Myra Cohn Livingston

Both through her poetry and her teaching, Myra Cohn Livingston inspired children to explore the music of language. She eventually wrote more than twenty collections of as well as several books on writing poetry, serving as an inspiration for students to enjoy poetry.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/livingston-myra-cohn

Johanna Loeb

Johanna Loeb’s philanthropic work extended to both Jewish and secular charities, such as the Home for Crippled Children, the Jewish Consumptive Relief Society of Chicago, the Home for the Jewish Friendless, and Chicago’s first Jewish Community Center. Her career not only strengthened the safety net for the disadvantaged throughout Chicago, but also illuminated the limitations and the potential that women’s philanthropic groups had in Jewish American society’s previously male-dominated community organizations.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/loeb-johanna

Sophie Irene Simon Loeb

At a time when widowed mothers often had no way to support their children, Sophie Irene Simon Loeb helped create support systems for needy children and their mothers. Loeb was one of many women to enter the political arena through reform work, using her life experience and a personalized approach.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/loeb-sophie-irene-simon

Sadie Loewith

Sadie Loewith was an early twentieth-century teacher, businesswoman, active Republican Party worker, chairperson, organizer, and politician of high repute.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/loewith-sadie

Hildegard Löwy

Born in 1922, Hildegard Löwy was the youngest member of the Baum Gruppe, a mainly Jewish resistance group against the Nazis. She had firm Zionist and pacifist principles and believed communism was the best way for Jews to obtain equal rights. Arrested in April 1942, Löwy tried to escape from prison but was ultimately convicted of Communist treason and executed in a Berlin prison.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/loewy-hildegard

Rebecca Touro Lopez

Rebecca Touro Lopez successfully appealed to the Rhode Island State Legislature to preserve the Touro Synagogue of Newport, one of the first cases of the government preserving an unoccupied historic building. The synagogue was restored and became a National Historic Site. Lopez requested a Newport burial and was interred in the cemetery of the synagogue she had fought to preserve.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lopez-rebecca-touro

Fannie Eller Lorber

When her community became a mecca for adults suffering from tuberculosis, Fannie Eller Lorber created a Jewish children’s home for those who had no one else to care for them. Lorber epitomized the volunteer spirit of urban Jewish women in the American West.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lorber-fannie-eller

Frieda Lorber

Frieda Levin Lorber made a name for herself as a prominent lawyer in the mid twentieth century and helped other women rise in the profession in New York and worldwide.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lorber-frieda

Marceline Loridan-Ivens

Marceline Loridan-Ivens, a French activist of the heart, was a writer, filmmaker, producer and actress whose experience of the Shoah, as a fourteen-year-old girl in Birkenau, marked the rest of her extraordinary life and work. As one of the most eloquent advocates for humanity and the power of memory, her reflection on identity as a Jewish woman is everywhere, from her committed documentary work with Jean Rouch and with her husband Joris Ivens, to her sensitive and moving writing of philosophical memoirs, to her writing and direction of what has become a classic of Jewish cinema, La Petite Prairie aux Bouleaux.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/loridan-ivens-marceline

Lot's Daughters: Midrash and Aggadah

In opposition to the biblical portrayal, the Rabbis turn the blame on Lot for his impregnation of his daughters. They argue that Lot exhibits selfish and harmful behavior throughout his life, while presenting a sympathetic analysis of the daughters that seems to stem from their ancestral connection to Ruth.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lots-daughters-midrash-and-aggadah

Lot's Wife: Midrash and Aggadah

Lot’s wife was initially spared from the impending destruction of Sodom, but her unrighteous ways cause her to have an unhappy end. Midrash and Aggadah provide insight into her actions.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lots-wife-midrash-and-aggadah

Deborah Lipstadt

Deborah D. Lipstadt is an American Jewish historian of issues surrounding understanding the Holocaust, ranging from reception of news of the extermination of European Jews to denial of the existence of the Holocaust. Lipstadt achieved renown for her defense against libel brought by David Irving, a British Holocaust denier. Her dramatic trial was transformed into a film starring Rachel Weisz.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lipstadt-deborah

Sarah Lishansky

A politically active nurse and midwife, Sarah Lishansky used her career to treat and care for workers in the Yishuv during the Second Aliyah.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lishansky-sarah

Clarice Lispector

Clarice Lispector was a Brazilian-Jewish novelist and short story writer. Considered one of Brazil’s most outstanding literary figures, she is internationally acclaimed as one of the greatest women writers of the twentieth century for the singularity of her novels and short stories.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lispector-clarice

Elisa Lispector

Polish-born writer Elisa Lispector was nine years old when her family immigrated to Brazil in 1920. Alongside her successful career as a public servant, Lispector was a writer who published seven novels and three books of short stories. Her second novel is semi-autobiographical in its grappling with Lispector’s Jewish immigration story.

http://qa.jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lispector-elisa

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