Wolfgang Roth

1930 - 2013

Retired Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary Professor Wolfgang Roth died just after midnight on November 25, of congestive heart failure at his home in Evanston, Illinois. He was surrounded by his family in his last days. Wolfgang Max Wilhelm Roth was born on October 1, 1930, in Darmstadt, Germany, to Kaethe (nee Fiebig), who was a nurse and to Ludwig Wilhelm Roth, a civil servant. Wolfgang completed his under graduate studies at the University of Heidelberg. He earned his masters and doctorate in theology and Old Testament literature at Victoria University, Toronto, Ontario, in 1959. He married Janet Pearson in 1956, and together they moved to Madya Pradesh, India, where Wolfgang taught biblical studies and languages at the Leonard Theological Seminary. Dr. Roth began teaching at Garrett Theological Seminary in 1967 and continued there until his retirement in 1996. He served as the Academic Dean from 1982-1985. He was named the Frederick Carl Eiselen Professor of Old Testament Interpretation in 1981. In his later life, Wolfgang negotiated the difficult landscape of Alzheimer's Disease-first as he cared for Janet, his wife of 49 years, and later, with the help of his second wife Mary Beth, when he received his own diagnosis. Wolfgang is survived by his wife Mary Beth, his brother Dietrich Karl Fritz of Grand Rapids, Michigan, his cousin Elizabeth Roos of Idstein, Germany, his children Katherine Beatrice of New York, NY, Paul Mitchell of Plymouth, MN, and John Christopher of Evanston, and his three grandchildren Daniel Mitchell, Margaret Susan, and Emily Katherine. A memorial service at Alice Millar Chapel in Evanston, IL is planned for Saturday, January 18th, 2014 at 3 pm.