Toward the Endless Day: The Life of Elisabeth Behr-Sigel

by Olga Lossky, Michael Plekon (Editor)

Elisabeth Behr-Sigel (1907-2005) was one of the most important Orthodox theologians of the twentieth century. For seventy years she helped her church, dispersed and uprooted from its cultural heritage, adapt to a new world. Born in Alsace, France, to a Protestant father and a Jewish mother, Behr-Sigel received a master's degree in theology from the Protestant Faculty of Theology at Strasbourg and began a pastoral ministry. It lasted only a year. Already attracted by the beauty of its liturgy and by its characteristic spirituality, Behr-Sigel officially embraced the Orthodox faith at age twenty-four.

During World War II her family (husband Andre Behr and their three children) lived in Nancy, France, where Behr-Sigel taught in the public school system. She later referred to this time as her real apprenticeship in ecumenism, when people of different traditions came together in opposition to Nazism, hiding Jews and providing escape routes.

After the war she took advantage of courses at St. Sergius Theological Institute in Paris, where she later joined the faculty. Behr-Sigel also taught at the Catholic Institute of Paris, the Dominican College of Ottowa, and the Ecumenical Institute of Tantur near Jerusalem. She wrote and published books in Orthodox theology, spirituality, and the role of women in the Orthodox Church. In her retirement she continued to work on behalf of women and of the ecumenical movement.

Published in 2007 in France as Vers le jour sans declin, this biography by the Orthodox writer Olga Lossky will bring to English-speaking readers of all religious persuasions the life and career of a remarkable and admirable woman of faith. Behr-Sigel fully cooperated with this biography, meeting with Lossky weekly during the last year of her life and giving Lossky access to her journal and personal letters.

"Elisabeth Behr-Sigel was a remarkable woman who lived in remarkable times. In a new century and in a changed world, we need her story desperately. Olga Lossky provides the window to a life that challenges us more with every passing day. We can be grateful to Jerry Ryan and Michael Plekon for bringing this book to the English-speaking readership." --Susan Ashbrook Harvey, Brown University

"Behr-Sigel had to reconcile a series of antinomies in her own life--Orthodox and Protestant, woman and theologian, eastern and Parisian, Jewish and Christian, married and ascetic, western in culture and imbued with Russian spirituality--and by her accomplishment she is a witness to us. It makes for fascinating reading to watch her accomplish this sobornicity in person, and Olga Lossky's careful biography makes that possible." --David Fagerberg, University of Notre Dame

". . . a thorough, readable, and deeply sympathetic study of one of the most outstanding modern Western interpreters of orthodoxy. For anyone who imagines that this tradition is marginal to the cultural history of twentieth-century Europe, this biography of a Protestant woman of Jewish family, balancing work, parenthood (single parenthood for a lot of the time), and scholarly and creative writing ought to produce some second thoughts." --Rowan Williams, Times Literary Supplement

 

344 pages, Hardcover

First published July 12, 2007

Reviews

[Kristofer Carlson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Elisabeth Behr-Sigel lived through the first and second World Wars, lived to see the fall of the Berlin Wall, and into the 21st century. She was one of the first women to receive a theological education in France; began her career as the first commissioned (rather than ordained) Protestant pastor before converting to Orthodoxy. She participated in some of the great theological controversies of the 2Oth century, including the two she is most well known for: ecumenicism and the role of women in the church. A friend of many of the great names of the Russian Orthodox diaspora, she was a formidable theologian in her own right---never speaking for or on behalf of the church, but always on behalf of the truth. Some of her most controversial issues were not couched as dogmatic statements demanding recognition, but as issues deserving further study within the church. By this, Elisabeth Behr-Sigel proved herself to be well-deserving of her status within the church, and it is hoped that recognition will be formalized by the church.

[Emma · Rating 5 out of 5]

VERDICT: Essential biography of the most important woman Orthodox theologian of our time. Of interest to all desiring to rediscover the richness of Incarnation and how it can lead us to communion with others, a goal so necessary to our current world.


my full review is here:
http://wordsandpeace.com/2016/03/14/b...

[Lee Downen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lossky offers readers an intelligent, lively biography of Elisabeth Behr-Sigel, the 20th-century French Orthodox theologian. Drawing on first-hand interviews, personal correspondences, and published works, Lossky portrays Behr-Sigel as a serious thinker, a generous ecumenicist, a caring wife, and a good friend to so many. I quite enjoyed the book, and will use its fine bibliography to track down some of Behr-Sigel's works. That said, it does have a mildly annoying unevenness about it: three of the four chapters are roughly 50 pages each while one chapter is 126 pages. I like to think that Lossky organized things this way as a nod to the demanding Russian asceticism that Behr-Sigel loved so much.

[Karissa Sorrell · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a wonderful biography of Orthodox theologian Elisabeth Behr-Sigel! I was so encouraged by her work toward the ordination of women in Orthodoxy! I was thrilled to know that she was a contemporary of (and friend of) Mother Maria of Paris. These two women have touched my life.

[Adam DeVille, Ph.D. · Rating 4 out of 5]

My thoughts of this fascinating book are here: http://easternchristianbooks.blogspot...

[Gail · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a well written book about an Orthodox Christian woman living in extraordinary times. She was a woman of courage, brilliant thinker and devote Christian. Well worth reading.