The Maid of Ludomir

Hannah Rachel Verbermacher (c. 1806-1888), known universally as the Maid of Ludomir (Ludmir / Volodymyr-Volynsky), is the only female Hasidic-style tzaddik in the entire history of the movement. Following a near-fatal childhood illness in which she reported a transformative spiritual experience, she began wearing tallit and tefillin, davening at the amud, and delivering Torah from behind a curtain to a male and female following that grew into the hundreds. She built her own beit midrash in Ludmir and held tisch.

The Hasidic establishment — led by R. Mordechai of Chernobyl — ultimately pressured her into marriage (twice, both unconsummated and quickly dissolved) to neutralize her singular status. In her later years she made aliyah to Jerusalem, lived near the Old City as a recluse and mystic, and is reported to have engaged in ascetic kabbalistic practices until her death in 1888. She remains the singular counter-example to Hasidism's male-only rebbe model.