Mattersdorf, Jerusalem (Wikipedia)
Part II
In the Service of the Community
When Chaya Esther Stern passed away on January 27, 1998, it was a sad moment not only for the large Stern family spread out over the U.S. and Israel, but it signaled the sunset of another generation of a family that had resolutely stood up to the trials of early America while maintaining and promoting an authentic Jewish environment. In the pre-War years, Yom Tov and Chaya Esther Stern raised her children with all-encompassing devotion, and ran her home so that it was a lighthouse of chesed and wisdom. After Yom Tov's passing and Chaya Esther's move to Eretz Yisroel, she naturally assumed the position of matriarch for her large family because of the reverence that all her descendants felt toward her.
Educational Principles
The Sterns felt that only the best Jewish education was acceptable since a strong foundation in Torah Yiddishkeit would last forever. When Moshe Aaron turned 5, Chaya Esther wanted him to attend a real cheder instead of the nearby day school. Although Yeshivas Chaim Berlin was 1.5 miles away, and the family didn't have enough money for more than one-way transportation, Chaya Esther enrolled her son in the school.
This mesirus nefesh for her son's education required her to walk her son 1.5 miles to school and back, do the trip by foot again to bring him his lunch, and then walk there again at 5 o' clock to bring him back home. That late hour was the only time they made the long trip by trolley. Chaya Esther maintained this schedule for three years, during stormy winter days and scorching hot ones. Her parents-in-law helped out by watching the other children when she was gone.
When their oldest son became sick with diphtheria and had to be hospitalized in a sanatorium for a whole year in New Jersey, both parents took turns traveling out to him to bring him meat and other food, to insure he would not be fed the treif food.
When her oldest son turned 8, Chaya Esther told him that if he would daven in shul with his father, he would get breakfast before going to cheder. But if he would daven at home, he would not get breakfast.
Getting out of bed early to go to minyan was not an easy feat. The house had no steam heat in the winter, and it demanded strong resolution to get out of bed and even put a foot on the freezing floor. One day the young lad couldn't resist and he turned over in bed and slept on until 8:30, long after his father was gone. When it was late, he jumped out of bed and dressed in five minutes and speedily finished shacharis by 8:45. "Ma — I have to eat breakfast in ten minutes and then I gotta go."
Chaya Esther gently refused. "Remember the Chinese laundryman to whom you bring the wash every week?"
"Yes."
"When you give him the wash, what does he give you?"
"A ticket to pick up the wash."
"And what does he say when you come without the ticket?"
"No ticket, no wash."
"No davening in shul, no breakfast."
Among the strongest values that she imparted to her children was the ehrlichkeit which was an nonnegotiable value in both her and her husband's homes. Lying was not permitted. No excuse existed in the world that could justify it.
The Sterns always displayed a united front. Never did the children hear them arguing. They had decided early on in their marriage that they would always hear each other respectfully out, and all arguments and disagreements would be held late at night in their room. In public, they treated each other like a king and queen. The children could not sit in their father's chair (according to the halacha of kibbud av), and could not touch the special meal their mother prepared for him at night. Since pears were very expensive, they were only for Papa, although he would often share them with the children.
The beautiful relationship that he saw in his parents' home later influenced her oldest son to emphasize in his shiurim to chassonim in Jerusalem that the key to a happy home life is the respect that the couple show each other. Without this, problems are guaranteed to arise. "If the husband treats the wife like a mop, and the wife treats the husband like a mop, the kids will treat them like two mops."
When their third son was married in Jerusalem in 1960, just before his chuppah his mother called him aside.
He was feeling tumultuous in those moments, and replied, "Can't it wait for another time?"
"I want to tell it now." Chaya Esther was a widow of a year and a half who had come specially for the wedding, but her son was hardly listening.
"What was your opinion of Papa and me?"
"I idolized both of you."
"Did you think we ever had arguments?"
"I didn't see it."
"You're wrong. We had many arguments. But from the day we got married, we agreed that we would hear each other out. No shouting matches. My dear son, don't believe that marriage is a bed of thorns, and don't believe that it's a bed of roses. You learn to adapt and consider your counterpart."
Saving a Holocaust Refugee
Yom Tov worked hard to support his large family, but at the same time engaged in countless acts of kindness, many of which never became known. He gave innumerable loans to people in need and did free accounting for struggling businessmen. Many times he paid medical care for polio victims.
When the family was sitting shiva for him, an unknown chassidic lady dropped by with her husband to visit the family. No one knew who she was but then she began to speak, "I have come today to pay a debt." Taking a sum of money from her purse, she explained that although she doesn't have the entire sum to pay back, she has carefully been saving up and will pay eventually pay it all. No one could still figure out who she was until she told her story:
"I am from an Hungarian Jewish home, and had managed to get aboard one of the last boats leaving Europe for America. I didn't know a soul and had no relatives that I knew of there. When our boat arrived at Ellis Island, all the other passengers had relatives who came to pick them up and provided affidavits for them. When the authorities saw there was no one for me, they told me that if no one came for me within 48 hours, I would be sent back to Europe. I was panic-stricken, because I feared what would befall me there. I went into a hysteria and threatened that if they would try and send me back, I would throw myself into the ocean first.
"One of my friends on the boat had a relative called Gross who had heard of my predicament. My sad plight weighed on her, and while she was working at her job in a kosher bakery, she began to weep. Just at that minute, Mr. Stern dropped by the bakery on his way home from shul to buy bread for the family. He asked Mrs. Gross why she was weeping, and as soon as he heard of my plight, he went into action — despite not knowing anything about me besides my name. He cancelled his meetings for that day, went to the bank and withdraw a sum of money to serve as a pledge for the government. He spoke with Rabbi Boruch Kaplan about accepting me into the Bais Yaakov school, and rented a room for me to live in from a Jewish woman, paying 12 months up front.
"Then he came out to Ellis Island and asked for me. I was surprised and didn't know why I was being called by the authorities. As soon as I came, he quickly instructed me in an undertone to call him "Lipa!" and pretend like I was his cousin. I saw he was a religious Jew, so I did what he said. Right there and then we put on an act like long-lost cousins who were finally reunited. As soon as he arranged the documents with the officials, they let me go.
"I didn't know where I was going, but I was exhilarated just to be in America and out of that hated screening center. How great was my surprise when Mr. Stern brought me to the Bais Yaakov Seminary, and introduced me to Rabbi Kaplan. He then took me to my room where I was to live for the next year. I had no words to thank him. But he wasn't finished yet. He thought I wasn't looking, but I saw that he slipped a bundle of money to my landlord and told her to buy me a complete set of Shabbos and weekday clothes right down to stockings, shoes and hairpins. How did he know that was just the thing a young girl alone needed to pick up her spirits?
"All these years, I am anxiously waiting to repay my loan, and as you see, I have finally brought part of it with me."
The bereaved Stern family listened thunderstruck to this story, which none of them had known of before. Chaya Esther was the first to recover, and she gracefully turned down the offer. "Thank G-d we do not need the money," she told the woman, "and anyway, these kind of loans are the kind we take with us to heaven."
Passing
In 5718(1958), Yom Tov died suddenly from a brain hemorrhage. He had been planning to retire a few years later, move to Israel to be near his married sons, and join a full-time Kolel.
Yom Tov Lipman Stern left behind not only a honorable family, but a sterling reputation. Dr. Hyman Frank a weekly columnist in a Jewish newspaper, once wrote that after examining hundreds of accountants, there were only two who were able to pass his test of honesty, one of whom was Yom Tov Lipman Stern.
The Family Matriarch
In 1968, Chaya Esther joined her two younger sisters, Mrs. Sheinberg and Mrs. Ruchama Shain, who had moved to a new neighborhood in Jerusalem called Mattersdorf. By this time, she had many children and grandchildren living in Israel. Her oldest son, Moshe Aaron, had been requested by her father, Reb Yaakov Yosef Herman, to come while yet a bochur, and he was followed years later by two other brothers. All had married into distinguished Yerushalmi families and set up distinguished homes. Moshe Aaron retained for many years the position of mashgiach in Yeshivas Kamenitz and popular lecturer the worldwide. Shmuel had founded an empire of orphanages and institutions (Bayit Lepletot, Kiryat Bnos, and Mother and Baby Convalescent Homes in Telz Stone) and Yosef is the mashgiach for American bochurim in Yeshivas Torah Or.
She maintained a close relationship with each of her dozens of grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She knew each by name, and remembered each one's birthday. In return, the entire family adored her, and the house was never empty of family members visiting her. Each felt the love and concern radiating to them. They also sought her blessings and advice. She was the epitome of the family matriarch — gentle, caring, loving and firm. Her sons consulted with her on every facet of their children's lives. Her granddaughters felt and indeed expressed it, "It's a privilege to be with Bubby Stern."
Nonetheless, when her son once asked her for a note recommending him to the trustees of a gemach she set up, she refused to give it. "No pull from me," she said. "Get the loan on your own merit."
Shmuel Yitzchok, who traveled to raise money for his institutions, made it a habit to visit her and receive a blessing before each trip he made to the United States on behalf of his institutions. A blessing from his mother, he had discovered with experience, had more impact than a rousing salesman's pep talk. Perhaps it was the boundless love that he felt accompanied the blessing. She gave lavish blessings, and expressed her wishes in abundant terms.
One trip Reb Shmuel Yitzchok had to leave on a midnight flight, and by the time he came to visit his mother, she was already asleep. Although he waited, she did not wake up and he had to leave without her send-off blessing.
That trip everything went sour. He felt that everything was coming out wrong, he was turning off people and within two days was falling into a slump. He took the next plane back to Israel and the first stop was his mother's address. "Why did you make this trip so short?" she asked.
"Everything was going wrong because I didn't get your blessing."
"Of course I'll bless you," Chaya Esther. Once equipped for the way, Shmuel Yitzchok returned to the States and this time was blessed with success.
Towards the last few years of her life, many people sought her blessings, and word got around that her blessings were granted. But not everyone who sought a blessing received one. When her son asked her why she wouldn't bless a certain person, she answered, "Not everyone is given a blessing from heaven."
Moving on to a Better World
On Pesach, 1990, Chaya Esther suffered her second heart attack. While gasping for air, she told the ambulance driver not to put on the siren so as not to frighten the local children. After a short hospitalization, she moved in to Neve Simcha convalescent home in Mattersdorf. From her room here, she continued to be the warm and loving matriarch to her descendants that she had already been.
On January 23,1998, Friday, she went into a coma. Two of her daughters took turns in being with her, and troops of sons, grandchildren and great-grandchildren anxiously visited and prayed on her behalf. A granddaughter in Israel had a dream in which her grandmother appeared as a young lady of 17 years, dressed in a white gown. "Where are you going, Bubby?" she asked. "I'm finished here with Neve Simcha, and I'm going home."
She later found out that at that minute, her grandmother had gone into a coma.
On Tuesday, erev Rosh Chodesh Shvat, 5758, Chaya Esther suddenly opened her eyes for the first time in three days, and a few tears rolled down. She mumbled a few words and then was gone.
The day after shiva, the first newborn descendant received her revered name, Chaya Esther.
