Ilse Härter

Ilse Härter (12 January 1912 - 28 December 2012) was a centenarian German Lutheran theologian. On her thirty-first birthday, in 1943, she was one of the first two women to be ordained in Germany.

Life Provenance and early years Ilse Härter was born in Asperden, a small village to the south of Kleve, and positioned within walking distance of the Dutch border. She was the second of her parents' three daughters. The family was not a particularly religious one, and Härter's career choice surprised her parents. She was asked about this later, and recalled a funeral ceremony for an aunt at which the celebrating minister had reassured those present that after three days the dead aunt would be resurrected. Intrigued, the child attempted to trigger a resurrection with a dead bird that she had found; but after being buried for three days the bird showed no sign of resurrection. She concluded that she would need to start with a living being, so she took her teddy bear, and waited till wash day. Persuading her mother to let her use the dirty water in which the clothes had been washed, she then thoroughly drowned the teddy bear in the dirty soapy water. She placed the "corpse" in a discarded cigar box, and gave the bear a dignified burial. Three days later she dug up the little grave, but there was no sign of the dead bear's condition having changed except that, since it was summer and he had been damp when buried, the body had acquired a garnish of mold. Clearly resurrection was no simple matter, but her determination to find out what it was all about was undiminished. She moved on to study Evangelical Theology at the University of Göttingen later in 1931. Meanwhile, the country was facing growing economic and social challenges in the political backwash from the Great Depression: politics were becoming polarised and dangerously contaminated by populist nationalism.

Studying theology during the Nazi years In January 1933 the Nazis took power and lost little time in transforming Germany into a one-party dictatorship. Ilse Härter was faced with a decision over whether or not to pursue her theological studies further, since she had absolutely no wish to become involved with the government backed German Christian movement. "This much had I learned during the first three semesters: this was about another bible and another God. I was also completely clear that I would not permit myself to be subjected to Nazi diktats on the role of women." On the advice of a fellow student she transferred to Königsberg in Prussia. "That meant I had decided to stick with Theology. In the colleges of Professors Julius Schniewind and Hans Iwand I was impressed by just how much the Bible could deliver guiding principles for the conflicts of those times. Because of the so-called Himmler Ordinance of 20 June 1938 she was not able to undertake equivalent exams that would have been recognised by the state authorities. Like other candidates for the exams promoted by the Confessing Church, she came to the attention of the Gestapo, but she was treated to only one interrogation session (at which she was threatened with court action Globig also paid heartfelt tribute to Härter's "co-operative working approach" (den "kooperativen Arbeitsstil“") and her committed leadership and training activities in respect of the Old Prussian Union church in Elberfeld. She also participated in numerous committees, not leastly in the "New ways to worship God" ("Gottesdienst in neuer Gestalt") Committee in the Rhineland.