In memory of Hindy Scheiman OBM
In honor of the 11th yahrzeit of Hindy Scheiman a’h for whom this organization receives its name
Hindy Scheiman was a uniquely kind and unassuming leader in the Chicago and Des Plaines, Ill., area Jewish communities. Together with her husband Rabbi Binyomin Scheiman, she was the co-director of Lubavitch Chabad of Niles, Il, where they raised their children together. She was also a teacher at Cheder Lubavitch Hebrew Day School.
Rabbi Scheiman, as the director of the Jewish Prisoners Assistance Foundation and chaplain for Jewish prisoners throughout Illinois, who stays in touch with many former inmates, sometimes will bring them home for meals and counseling. “Not everyone would be comfortable with that,” said Rabbi Daniel Moscowitz a”h of Chabad of Illinois. “Mrs. Scheiman took that as a matter of fact, welcoming them and helping them embrace their future.” “I am grateful,” says Rabbi Scheiman, “that my wife made that possible for so many people, as not many others would let them into their home. These individuals were always welcome into our home.”
Hindy Scheiman was born in 1958 in Brooklyn, N.Y. to Azriel and Shifra Schanowitz. Her childhood home was open and filled with guests from all backgrounds. Hindy and her siblings took that to heart, and kept their homes open as well. Acquaintances say she ran a home with seemingly no lock on the door. “There is a hospital close by,” explains her brother, Rabbi Yosef Schanowitz, co-director of North Suburban Lubavitch Chabad in Highland Park, Ill., “and her home was open to anybody who needed to stay there overnight, for a few hours or just for a meal.”
“She did everything for others,” said Rabbi Moscowitz, “as if it was normal, as if it was nothing special or out of the ordinary.”
Lakey Silber, the former director of the Cheder Lubavitch Hebrew Day School’s preschool division says that Hindy gave individualized instruction to her students, based on the child’s particular needs: “The kids connected to her because she was very embracing and very nurturing. Her care extended to the parents as well. She always had a nice word for the parents and was sensitive to everyone’s needs.”
In the growing Chabad Chicago community, she set an example for many who were just learning the basic tenets of Judaism. Hindy exemplified what the Rebbe—Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory—said about serving Gd “with faith and genuine joy.” She fulfilled this ideal whole- heartedly, and that this was personified by the fact that very few people realized the extent of her illness. The concept of complete faith and trust in Gd epitomized the life of this exceptional teacher and mother.