Elisabeth Raiser (née Bertha Elisabeth Freiin von Weizsäcker) is a 21st-century historian, former President of the

German Evangelical Church Assembly The German Evangelical Church Assembly (German ''Deutscher Evangelischer Kirchentag'', DEKT) is an assembly of lay members of the Evangelical Church in Germany, that organises biennial events of faith, culture and political discussion. History ...

, and daughter of

Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker Carl Friedrich Freiherr von Weizsäcker (; 28 June 1912 – 28 April 2007) was a German physicist and philosopher. He was the longest-living member of the team which performed nuclear research in Germany during the Second World War, under ...

Life and career

Born as Bertha Elisabeth Freiin von Weizsäcker in Zurich, Switzerland on August 18, 1940, Elisabeth Raiser is the daughter of polymath

and niece of

Richard von Weizsäcker Richard Karl Freiherr von Weizsäcker (; 15 April 1920 – 31 January 2015) was a German politician ( CDU), who served as President of Germany from 1984 to 1994. Born into the aristocratic Weizsäcker family, who were part of the German nobilit ...

, former president of the Federal Republic of Germany. Her husband is Reverend Dr.

Konrad Raiser Konrad Raiser (born 25 January 1938) is a former General Secretary of the World Council of Churches (WCC). Biography Born in Magdeburg, Germany on 25 January 1938, Raiser spent his childhood in Schwerin, Göttingen and Bad Godesberg. After gra ...

. She studied history and Romance languages and, like her mother before her, earned her doctorate in history. In addition, she has been active with various ecumenical activities throughout her life, and served as the president of the first German Evangelical Church Assembly. In June 2018, she and her husband spoke at the Pfarrhaustreff in Diedersdorf and introduced a short version of ''Kreisgang'', the film she directed regarding her father's life and work as a philosopher, physicist and peace activist. The film explores the spiritual experiences which helped shape her father throughout his life, according to Potsdam's ''Märkische Allgemeine'', including the "divine grace

hich Ij ( fa, ايج, also Romanized as Īj; also known as Hich and Īch) is a village in Golabar Rural District, in the Central District of Ijrud County, Zanjan Province, Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also ...

prevented him and his colleagues from having to build the atomic bomb for Hitler" during the period he worked with

Werner Heisenberg Werner Karl Heisenberg () (5 December 1901 – 1 February 1976) was a German theoretical physicist and one of the main pioneers of the theory of quantum mechanics. He published his work in 1925 in a breakthrough paper. In the subsequent series ...

and

Otto Hahn Otto Hahn (; 8 March 1879 – 28 July 1968) was a German chemist who was a pioneer in the fields of radioactivity and radiochemistry. He is referred to as the father of nuclear chemistry and father of nuclear fission. Hahn and Lise Meitner ...

on Germany's uranium project.Ujlaki, "Erinnerungen an Carl-Friedrich von Weizsäcker" ("Memories of Carl-Friedrich von Weizsäcker"), ''Märkische Allgemeine''.

References

External links

Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Raiser, Elisabeth Weizsäcker family German Protestants 1940 births Living people German expatriates in Switzerland