BORN OF

RABBI SHLOMO BOCHNER was a hardworking businessman when he and his wife Chanie received the news that dashed their O hopes of ever having a family of their own. But pain H also has a place, and they used theirs to help other struggling couples, enlisting the most advanced doctors and treatments, yet never losing sight of the Third Partner

By Yisroel Besser PPhotos Naftoli Goldgrab

48 MISHPACHA 3 Cheshvan 5781 | October 21, 2020 EMISHPACHA 49 was once at one of those it, to tell how their own pain became healing for others, and in this way, it dinner planning meetings healed them too. where people eat sushi and The Bochners got married in 1979, with the same dreams of every young talk vaguely about what couple — the large family, the noise and laughter and action — so the should be done, and someone expectation hung around for a while. Sometimes it takes longer. Don’t panic. said that they really needed a There are amazing doctors. A few more years of quiet are not the worst thing. guest speaker in order to draw But then it was a few more years and a few more years on top of that and a crowd. The organization’s the chorus of reassurance started to fade, and then it was just Reb Shloime head asked why his speech and his wife in a car on their way to yet another appointment with their wouldn’t be as interesting as doctor, who asked how the day was going and was it raining and also, he any paid speaker’s — didn’t he thought they should think in terms of closure because they would not have know the challenges better children. than anyone else? Couldn’t he It was quiet in the car on the way home. What was the point? tell the organization’s story Depressing thoughts, Reb Shloime concedes now, but that’s what he was best of all? Yes, someone said feeling. politely, he was right in theory, As they headed down the FDR Drive toward Brooklyn, Chanie spoke first. but l’maiseh, that’s not how it “Shloime, for 20 years now, we’ve been working and gathering information. “Shloime, for works. People want to be entertained, or moved, We know all the treatments, we have cell-phone numbers that no one else and they need a name from outside the back office. has, we have connections and experience. It’s time to share it with others.” 20 years now, The director was frustrated, and a little miffed. Now, sitting in their tasteful home, Rabbi Bochner looks at me and says, “Then how come,” he asked, “at every Bonei Olam “What can I say? I wasn’t there yet. She was. She was ready.” we’ve been dinner, Rabbi Bochner’s speech is the highlight of Like the next day type of ready. Reb Shloime came home from selling the night?” coats to see a group of women gathered around his kitchen table. working and I don’t remember if there was an answer, but “I didn’t doubt that she was right about the need, I knew that infertility now, I think I get it. Rabbi Shlomo Bochner and was taboo in the community in the late ’90s, the elephant in the communal gathering his wife, Chanie, aren’t telling the story of an or- room. It needed someone to take it on, but I didn’t think I was that someone. ganization. It’s their story, and Bonei Olam is part I’m not a fundraiser or administrator,” says the man now responsible for a information. of it. Two people, two hearts, with one shared ten-million-dollar budget. challenge and one shared goal. Everything else He remembers a conversation with one of the prominent poskim of the We know all came later. time, an older, respected rav. Reb Shloime asked his sh’eilah, a fertility issue with serious halachic ramifications. The rav looked up and said honestly, the treatments, abbi Bochner doesn’t just look “Ich veis nisht vus di redst, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” like your typical Boro Park “Boro Park was the loneliest place in the world for a couple facing we have cell- businessman, that’s actually infertility — it was like we were living on our own planet.” His features what he is — a Bobover chassid soften for a moment. “But there was one person who understood. My phone numbers with decades of experience in the rebbe. That was it.” garment industry as a designer The Rebbe, Rav Shlomo of Bobov, heard the pain of his young chassid. that no one else Rand buyer. And even as he talks of his personal “His advice was always to go b’temimus, to go with traditional Yiddishe journey — the loneliness and challenge and tools and not try to do more than humanly possible. He let me know he has, we have heartache — there is a certain hesitation. It’s clear understood the pain and loneliness, and we had many long conversations.” he has to push himself to talk. Once, the chassid was traveling to Eretz Yisrael and he sought the connections You may have read that men don’t share Rebbe’s brachah. “Shloime,” the Rebbe said gently, “go to the kevarim, go emotions easily, don’t share personal feelings to the mekomos hakedoshim, say some Tehillim… and more than that you and experience. with each other. If this is true (it is), then it’s even can’t do.” truer of heimishe men. More than that you can’t do. “It was like we were living on our It’s time to At times, he will look to his wife to fill in the Once, when disappointment had already given way to despair, Reb own planet.” Rabbi Shlomo Bochner words for him, but she doesn’t: She wants him Shloime came in to the Rebbe, who remarked, “A Yid has to be b’simchah. speaks of the loneliness and isolation share it with to talk, to convey this story. She needs him to say The Torah says so.” he and his wife faced, today helping to make sure others don’t others” 50 MISHPACHA Subject

“We didn’t have much, I’d been working several jobs to pay for our own 20-year struggle to have children, and I didn’t think we could help,” Reb Shloime reflects. “Then Chanie looked at me and said, ‘Shloime, they have a real chance to have children but they might lose it, they’re in the middle of a cycle and their window is closing…we can’t let that happen because of money.’ So we found money to lend them.” The couple came home with twins. And the Bochners saw what a few dollars at the right time could do. Bonei Olam, “Builders of Worlds,” can come across as a presumptuous name for an organization — except that it’s true. They were building worlds and so they never looked back. It wasn’t just the listening ear, the money, or the expertise. “People are intimidated by top doctors, like they’re a different species,” says Reb Shloime. “They’re not. You just have to know how to work with them.” Rabbi Bochner learned early on that a private cell-phone number isn’t enough. “There’s no match for personal advocacy. I would try to catch them on the way into work, or after hours, and explain the cause. Most good doctors want to make a difference, that’s what they signed up for. I don’t think any doctor ever told me no.” There was ironic, bittersweet joy of helping couples “Rebbe,” Rabbi Bochner asked, “is it around him, he nodded. “Okay,” he said experience parenthood — even couples facing the very same really possible to be b’simchah in this finally. “That wasn’t diagnosis that had stymied the Bochners. situation?” “I’m not a therapist, but I realize what easy, working “That wasn’t easy, working through the realization that The Bobover Rebbe placed his hands Chanie was doing for me,” Rabbi Bochner if an organization like Bonei Olam had been around, maybe over his face, lost in thought. Then, he reflects, sharing these profundities while through the our destiny would have been different…. that’s whereemunah spoke. “You know what, Shloime? You’re spreading cream cheese on a bagel. He has comes in. It made us stronger, and gave us a clear sense of our right… but af al pi kein… a Yid has to work only one setting — completely direct and realization mission,” Rabbi Bochner says. “You know, people think I’m a on it.” candid — and there’s no indication that that if an rock, that I have no feelings. I’m really very weak,” he adds, and Al af pi kein…the secret of the Bobover he’s uncomfortable sharing this. his wife looks up and laughs out loud. Rebbe’s radiant smile, and the secret of “A person needs hope, something to organization this couple, seated across from me, and live for… and once we got our diagnosis, You’re All In the smiles they’ve brought to thousands she simply took the hope that had carried like Bonei Mrs. Bochner realized that they needed to make a fundraising of families. us until then and gave us something else Olam had event for a cause that, in 1999, was not yet popular or out there. to hope for. We started to live for other “But it turned out that quietly, people were aware of it. There At the Right Time people and their chance of becoming been around, were many families affected by it. And early on,” she says, “we It was Erev Yom Kippur, a few months parents.” learned how to welcome people to our team. Today we have after Mrs. Bochner started speaking with First it was just listening. “Therapists maybe our offices across the world, and most of our staff members continue families facing similar challenges, but her and rabbanim are great and they give destiny would to be volunteers. People are generous, they’re helpful, they’re husband still wasn’t on board. chizuk, but let’s be honest, you can’t amazing. Even if at the start, it was awkward to explain what we Yet as he was headed out to shul for Kol understand this parshah if you don’t know have been were doing, today, they all feel like they’re building homes and Nidrei, moments before Yom Kippur was it personally.” lives.” to begin, she stopped him at the doorway. The Bochners knew a lot, not just different…. It meant suggesting treatment, making the connections, then “Shloime, I need you to do this with me. about infertility, but about how to access that’s where funding treatment — and suddenly, new doors were swinging Please.” doctors — and they helped with that too. open. In his tallis and kittel, the awe of the But one day, a couple asked to borrow emunah “You know how it is, once you know a little bit, people expect impending day spread out like a blanket money to fund treatments. comes in” you to know a lot, and we started getting calls about shidduchim,

52 MISHPACHA 3 Cheshvan 5781 | October 21, 2020 MISHPACHA 53 Born of Hope

Some time later, at a wedding, Reb but even the emotional effects. He wrote And then Rav Steinman answered his own Shloime was sitting by the chuppah the basic protocol for Bonei Olam and question: “Maybe, Reb Shloime, maybe when he sensed someone sliding into charged his talmid, Rav Moshe Shaul you’ll feel the tzaar and pain of another the chair next to him. It was this same Klein (the current head of Rav Wosner’s and make it your pain, and that itself about researching genes and mutations,” philanthropist, who was mumbling beis din), with serving as the rav of the opens new gates and creates new zechusim. says Reb Shloime. “Every time you can about a genetic issue and needing help Israeli branch. Maybe that’s what you’re doing.” identify a gene that causes an issue, if and someone who suggested he speak The creation of the Israel office exposed you can test and see that a young man or to Bochner. “He was just a person who Reb Shloime and his wife to another special Dance with your Child woman doesn’t have that gene, then you needed help, and that’s all I saw at that relationship. Reb Shloime seems to shrink, Often, Bonei Olam will match up a couple can move forward on a shidduch with moment. So we tried.” as if in humility. “We would go in to Rav who needs financial assistance with a confidence, right? So I threw myself into Reb Shloime quotes another piece of Aharon Leib Steinman and it was like a jolt donor, offering thezechus to potentially that too, creating a staff of researchers wise advice from Rav Zoberman. “He of chizuk — our relationship was like that of sponsor human life. “I was once in a focusing on genetics-related issues in suggested that I travel to Eretz Yisrael and a father and son. Somehow, he understood certain shul and I saw a man who I the wider frum community. We used our meet Rav Shmuel HaLevi Wosner ztz”l, us, understood not just the topic but the thought could help. I approached him and know-how to create new relationships which was extremely helpful. Having a realities of life for us, so he was always asked if he would sponsor the treatments with labs and medical centers, and to date, presence in Eretz Yisrael allowed us to extremely upbeat and encouraging.” for another person in that shul, though I over 30 new genetic mutations have been Today, everyone can be a partner in creating life help so many more people, people who And so, so honest. didn’t tell him who, of course. He agreed.” identified through our efforts.” had never believed help was possible.” Once, Rav Aharon Leib told Rabbi Donors can get a pin number of the Infertility, it turned out, was the Rav Wosner, several generations older Bochner, “Shloime, why do we need Bonei couple they’re assisting, in order to chart intersection between pain and pain. than the people Bonei Olam was servicing, Olam? If Hashem wants someone to have progress, but that’s as much information “Cancer became our expertise as well, document that’s actually been kept is the in Crown Heights need help, people understood not just the halachic and children, then they will have. If He doesn’t, as they can get. because we suddenly had parents of a stipulation that, until today, the Bochners in Teaneck need help, and people in practical ramifications of every case, then they won’t. So vos iz di ganzte shpiel?” “But on Simchas Torah two years later, I child or a teenage cancer patient who don’t take a salary from Bonei Olam. Williamsburg need help. If you keep needed guidance about the patient’s Being all in means that there is always a getting held up by intra-frum politics, the ability to have children in the future, and sense of urgency. people who need it won’t get help.” people were like, ‘Oh, call Bonei Olam,’ so “The stakes are too high to mess up or The reserved Bobover chassid learned we did that too, figured out the halachic slack off,” Mrs. Bochner says. “Sometimes that true empathy doesn’t wear a shtreimel and medical ramifications and made it I’m trying to get an appointment for or beketshe, and that he had a new family possible.” someone and the receptionist is pushing forming quicker than he thought possible. Rabbi Bochner isn’t one for casual me off, but it’s not an option to let There was the phone, couples waiting schmoozing, leaving the social niceties to that happen. I spend time fighting the on the front steps at night, and shy people his wife. At one point, when I ask a detail insurance companies — they think IVF is shuffling around in the back of shul, about the founding of the organization, a procedure like cosmetic surgery, that it’s asking for a moment of his time. he waves his hand and says, “That’s not not that vital, so it’s always a battle. I feel “Infertility doesn’t differentiate interessant.” I understand this better like I’m always at war with them.” between rich and poor, prominent when he remarks, “This area of askanus When she says this, I have an image of families or great rebbes,” he says. “I isn’t halfway. If you’re in, you’re all the the person at the other end of the phone remember approaching a wealthy man for way in. No vacations. No breaks. No and I pity them. a donation, and I told him a bit about what turning the phone off. And we were in.” “Tooth and nail,” says Rabbi Bochner we were doing. ‘Oh please, today people He’s not here to do nostalgia. He’s all in. with a tinge of pride, “she fights for her start organizations because they’re bored, In, says Mrs. Bochner, means that her patients.” they need something to do, this doesn’t husband might be at a show in Hong speak to me,’ he said. That was that. I Kong, browsing racks of new coats while Two Pockets was hurt, but Rav Moshe Zoberman, clutching his cell phone, on a conference Along with the backend, the doctors a respected maggid shiur and talmid call with a doctor and a hopeful couple. and lab reports and tests, aside from the chacham in Bobov who was a mentor to Originally, she admits, when she pulled administration and fund-raising, came me, told me that if I was raising funds, I him in, she signed a shtar, a contract with a new challenge — diplomacy. Rabbi had to have two pockets: one for money him, that would allow him to step back if it Bochner, ambassador of the organization, and one for bizyonos. I tried not to let it was too much. The only condition in that figured it out quickly. “Because people bother me.”

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Mishpacha’s Yisroel Besser with Reb Shloime. Two decades in, the Bochners see every baby born as an answer to the doctor who spoke to them of closure

internationally, including Canada, Shabbos descends, and the thought of COMMON ACT, COMMON HOPE Europe, Australia, and Israel. Most of the thousands of Jewish women finding room To be honest, I’d always wanted to interview the Bochners, but offices have a few full-time workers, but in their hearts and in their tefillos for us… they seemed unreachable. I had tried at various times over the there is a support staff of caseworkers, the chizuk we get from this campaign has years, and they were too busy, or not ready to talk, but over mostly volunteers, backing them up. carried us through these last few months.” this past summer, there was a campaign that drew widespread It always starts with a phone call, but, Early on, it was hard for the Bochners interest. During the most auspicious moments of the week, as if the situation calls for it, the intake because they were breaking barriers that Friday’s bustle and commotion suddenly gives way to Shabbos’s specialist will then assign the caller a were never broken down for them. serenity, the clouds of peace descend on Jewish homes as counselor that will walk the couple along Today, they see it differently. Two mothers place a few coins in the pushke before reaching out to went back to that same shul,” Reb Shloime time. “Listen to me, you will see great the path of diagnosis, halachah, and then decades in, they see every baby born as an ignite the flame of Shabbos. recalls. He approached the glowing new siyata d’Shmaya,” the aged rosh yeshivah treatment. Though Rabbi Bochner knows answer to the doctor who spoke to them It’s more of a private time, not a great moment for national father, dancing with his newborn son in pleaded. about every case, more recently he is only of closure. If one path was blocked, 9,542 campaigns, but somehow, the “Vezakeini” campaign — one his hands, and asked if they could tell the On his return to America, Reb Shloime involved in the most complex situations. new ones opened since. dollar a week from eighteen thousand women that could fund a donor the truth about whom he’d helped. shared the Rosh Yeshivah’s directive This year, Covid-19 brought its own Additionally, infertility specialists treatment for a couple hoping for children — felt right. Jewish The father instantly agreed and Reb with his close friend and bungalow- unique challenges. from across the world now turn to Bonei women joined not just in common action and common hope Shloime carried the tiny baby over the colony neighbor, Rabbi Chaim Aryeh Zev “Everything went haywire. Appoint- Olam for direction, and the organization for their own children, but in determination to help their sisters donor. “Dance with your child,” said Reb Ginzberg. Rabbi Ginzberg heard, and ments were canceled, and for people on a and its in-house team has contributed to experience motherhood as well. Shloime, “take him and dance on Simchas hurried home to speak to his rebbetzin. certain schedule, that can be devastating,” many studies. A new generation of poskim The concept grew out of a single moment. Bonei Olam’s Torah.” Within half an hour, they asked for said Mrs. Bochner. “Next month is not the has been trained at the regular sessions director of marketing Rabbi Boruch Goldberger was sitting at The donor looked confused, but only the zechus to form Ohel Sara’la, carrying same as this month. The labs were shut hosted by Bonei Olam, and they are ready the Siyum HaShas in January, contemplating the request made for a moment. Then, with shaking arms, the name of their beloved daughter down, the medical staff unavailable.” and able to guide couples through the in the hadran — that the Torah not weaken in the mouths of our he took the child and they formed a little Sara’la a”h, and within the month, And the donations tried up too. Wealthy difficult maze of infertility. children and their children — and the plight of those who don’t circle, he, the father, and Reb Shloime, Rabbi Ginzberg took to the pages of this people suddenly worried about their own There is a knock on the front door, and yet have children. “If every person in this stadium gave a dollar,” the one in whose heart they’d been joined magazine to launch the innovative plan. businesses and investments. as Mrs. Bochner rises to open it, there is he thought, “we could help so many more couples.” together. “It started slow,” says Reb Shloime, “The Ribbono shel Olam has always another knock on the glass porch door in That led to the launch of a program asking for one dollar. Rav Steinman widened the organiza- “but after Rav Steinman’s petirah, it really been our partner, and I went back to Him. back. The response was quick and generous, eighteen thousand tion’s net yet further. picked up. Over a thousand shidduchim ‘For 21 years I’ve been doing this,’ I said, Somehow, she opens both doors and becoming twenty-five thousand, each dollar bill a note of chizuk, “He suggested that we connect singles were made since it was launched.” ‘I didn’t ask for it. You sent me here, You comes back to where her husband is compassion, and empathy. waiting for their shidduchim with couples And this, in a way, is part of the Bonei gave me a mission and I’m trying. Tell me, sitting with me. “Aside from helping these couples,” Rabbi Goldberger waiting for children, the singles funding Olam story too, a huge circle of dancing Bashefer, what I should do now?’ ” “Can you believe it?” she asks brightly, reflected, “we accomplished something else. Not everyone treatment and the couples davening for Jews — invisible, eternal lines connecting Then came V’zakeini, a program in “at one door there is a meshulach and at can afford to cover treatment for a couple, and until now, only the singles. The Rosh Yeshivah quoted the them with this couple who sit and calmly which women pledge one dollar before the other, a little girl is selling flowers for wealthy donors had the zechus of enabling a family to be built. pasuk, ‘Ulai ibaneh mimenah — Maybe I sip coffee as if we are discussing trends candle lighting on Erev Shabbos, which tzedakah! We must be doing something Now, every person can be part of it. For one dollar, you can earn will be built from her.’ When Sarah Imenu in the garment industry rather than the was not just a financial help, bringing right, Shloime, if Hashem is sending us that merit as well.” gave Hagar to Avrahom Avinu, she herself international army of neshamos they have in over twenty thousand dollars every two zechusim at once, no?” Against this backdrop, out of gratitude to the masses of Jewish merited a child. spawned. Friday, but much more than that to Bonei She rummages around in her wallet as women who’ve partnered with them and their families, the For the Bochners, involved in hard Olam’s founders. her husband reaches into his pocket, the Bochners felt ready to share their story. data and medical minutiae, it seemed Our Partner “Those are the most exalted moments question hanging there. beyond the scope of their mission, but Rav Today, along with the main headquarters in the week,” Reb Shloime says. “There’s He shrugs softly. “Maybe,” he says, Aharon Leib asked again and then a third in Boro Park, there are 13 offices a ‘ra’ash,’ a commotion in Shamayim as “maybe.” —

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