An innovative pact pairs up modern-day Yissachars and Zevuluns

Photos: Jordan Odinsky and Mrs. Greenblatt

Question: What do a financial planner in Edison, New Jersey, and a posek in Beitar, Israel have in common?

Answer: Everything.

IT all started when venture capitalist Jonathon Triest of Oak Park, Michigan, told a friend, Jordan Odinsky of Ground Up Ventures, about his newest business endeavor: a Yissachar-Zevulun partnership. Jonathon explained that at first, he had been reluctant to take on the major commitment, but he wanted the zechus, and with his rav’s blessing, he agreed to go ahead with it.

“Jonathon, you’ll also see a lot of brachah in your business from this,” his rav said. “Just wait.”

“That would be awesome,” Jonathon replied, “but my motivation is really the zechus of learning, not the money.”

His rav smiled. “You’ll see,” he repeated.

Recounting their conversation, Jordan admits he was skeptical.

“Jonathon tried encouraging me to do it too and told me, ‘The second you sign the shtar, you’re going to see immeasurable brachah in your life. Twelve hours later we had our largest acquisition to date — when PayPal bought one of our companies.’ ”

Well, says Jordan, the evidence was certainly convincing. “Not everyone is going to see a billion-dollar outcome, but there’s no doubt the partnership is a conduit for incredible hatzlachah and brachah,” Jordan says.

That was the first seed for Smach Zevulun.

“It started completely lo lishmah,” Jordan admits. “I also wanted a billion dollar outcome. But then the seeds grew roots.”

Jordan went home and shared the story with his wife, and the two of them started thinking about a similar partnership.

The Start-Up

In the summer of 2015, the Odinskys moved to Eretz Yisrael, eager to embrace what the Land had to offer. The country, the young couple soon found, is overflowing with the kol Torah, the singsong of learning loud enough to drown out a missile siren. Yeshivos nestle on narrow cobbled alleys, shtiblach are situated on every corner, and huge institutions of tefillah and learning stand majestically on random streets, overlooking neighborhoods like proud, watchful parents.

They also realized that many in the Land of Milk and Honey are suffering from dire poverty.

The same avreichim learning with fiery devotion often come home to empty tables, hungry mouths, and financial needs in which their wives’ meager salaries barely make a dent.

Rabbi Yechiel Greenblatt of Jerusalem’s Givat Hamivtar neighborhood was spending most of his waking hours running the Kupat Givat Hamivtar tzedakah organization when he met the young balabos who moved in across the street. The unlikely duo hit it off, becoming close friends, and eventually partners in a groundbreaking initiative.

Rabbi Greenblatt reminisces, “We were walking home from shul one day, and Jordan said he knows people back in the US who are earning great livings and just don’t have the time to sit and learn all day. They’re real givers, supporting many different causes, but sometimes it feels like it isn’t hitting the mark.”

The two agreed that donors would feel more fulfillment if they could provide for lomdei Torah in a direct manner. And so they wondered: Could they create a streamlined system to facilitate and ease the maintenance of such a partnership?