The renowned Sefardic Torah giant, Rabbi Chayim Yosef David Azulai (known as the "Chida," 1724-1806) in his bibliographic work Shem Gedolim, has a special listing for "Rabbanit" ("Rebbetzin").
He quotes the Talmud (Megilla 14a) that the Jewish people had seven prophetesses: Sara, Miriam, Devora, Chana, Avigayil, Chulda and Esther. In a commentary in Genesis, Rashi says that all the Matriarchs were prophetesses.
The Chida mentions the renowned Bruria, daughter of Rabbi Chanina ben Tradyon and wife of Rabbi Meir (both Tanaim - Sages mentioned in the Mishna). The Talmud says she would review 300 teachings of 300 Torah masters in a single day. She knew so much that she could express her own opinion in questions of Jewish legal matters, disagreeing with respected Tanaim, while others endorsed her opinion. So authoritative was Bruria considered, that eminent Tanaim would reverently quote how she rebuked them for not adhering properly to the teachings of the Sages.
On occasion she would even rebuke students for poor learning habits, giving as her source her interpretation of a scriptural verse, an interpretation that the Talmud later quoted.
The foremost commentator Rashi, Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki (c. 1040-1105) had three daughters and no sons. His daughters were known to be outstandingly knowledgeable in Torah. Once, Rashi lay sick, with no strength to write a profound and complicated reply to a query he had received. He therefore asked his daughter Rachel to write it. This may mean that he dictated it to her; even so, it reveals Rashi's confidence in her ability to accurately transcribe the complicated subject matter, for which she must have been a considerable scholar.
Maharshal, Rabbi Shlomo Luria (c. 1510-1573), one of the greatest Torah authorities in a generation of great luminaries, writes of an ancestress of his, some seven generations back:
"The Rabbanit Miriam, daughter of the Gaon Rabbi Shlomo Shapiro and sister of Rabbi Peretz of Kostenitz, of a continuous line of Torah scholars tracing its ancestry to Rashi...who had her own yeshiva, where she would sit with a curtain intervening, while she lectured in Jewish law before young men who were outstanding Torah scholars."
Nor was this phenomenon confined to the Ashkenazi lands where the prevailing non-Jewish mores were more tolerant of women in positions of prominence. Rabbi Pesachya of Regensburg, Germany (c. 1120-1190), one of the Baalei Tosafot contemporary with Maimonides, traveled extensively, and an account of his travels still exists. He wrote about Rabbi Shmuel Halevi ben Ali, dean of the yeshiva of Baghdad in those days, had an only daughter known to be expert in both the Bible and Talmud. Despite the emphasis on modesty, she would teach young men Tanach. She would sit indoors near a window through which she could be heard, while her male students would listen outside on a lower level where they could not see her.
Another woman of this period who is recorded as being a Torah scholar was Dulce, the saintly wife of Rabbi Elazar of Worms (1160-1238), renowned author of Sefer Rokeach and other works and one of the greatest "Chasidei Ashkenaz" (the pious German Kabalists of the 12th-13th centuries).
Together with her two daughters, she died a martyr's death in 1197 at the hands of Crusaders who murdered them in her husband's presence. He mourned her in a touching elegy in which he describes her as extremely pious and wise, hospitable to the Torah scholars, expert in the rules of Torah prohibitions, and as one who would preach every Shabbat - to women, we assume.
Historians mention other women of this period who were very knowledgeable in Torah. Usually they are known only by the Torah books they wrote in Yiddish for other women to study, or for their translations of classic Torah works into Yiddish.
The Previous Lubavitcher Rebbe writes, "Several women in the generations of the Tanaim and Amoraim, and also in generations closer to us, were knowledgeable in Torah." The Previous Rebbe might have had in mind his ancestress Perel, the scholarly wife of the renowned Maharal of Prague, Rabbi Yehuda Liva ben Betzalel (1512- 1609).
The Maharal was ten years old when he was engaged to Perel, who was then six (as was common at the time). Realizing his great genius, she decided to study Torah assiduously so that she would never be an embarrassment to her great husband. She said that from age eight, no day passed when she did not spend at least five hours studying Torah. Perel arranged and redacted all 24 of her husband's renowned works. It is said that in at least eight places she found errors in his works where he had misquoted Talmudic Sages, Rashi or Tosafot.
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