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By: Anita Bushell
Bringing BFS into the Larger World
An Interview with Thomas Chamberlain '15, Michelle Li '15, and Terry Kung, Director of College Counseling
It's not every year that three Brooklyn Friends School alumni graduate from Stanford University but that is exactly happened on June 16, 2019. Thomas Chamberlain, Daisy Feddoes and Michelle Li – all BFS class of 2015 – collected their diplomas at the 128th commencement of the venerable California institution.
Thomas received a Bachelor's degree in Philosophy and was aproduction and historical archive specialist for Ken Burns' upcoming PBS documentary Gene, An Intimate History.
Daisy was awarded a B.A. in Psychology and East Asian Studies. She studied abroad at Doshisha University and was an educational intern at the Institution for a Global Society in Tokyo.
Michelle received a B.S. in Mathematical and Computational Science with honors. She was a research assistant at Stanford University School of Medicine and an intern with Genentech.
BFS Journal contributing writer Anita Bushell recently spoke to Terry Kung, Director of College Counseling, as well as Thomas and Michelle about their experience at BFS, the transition to Stanford, and what the future holds for them. (Daisy was unavailable for an interview; we hope to catch up and share her story in the near future.)
What is the implication of these three students graduating from Stanford and what does it mean for BFS?
Terry Kung
Terry: The class of 2015 was the very first group of students I worked with at BFS, and the last class to experience our former Upper School space on Willoughby. I hit the ground running as they were knee deep in the college process and they warmly placed their trust in my guidance. The very fact that three unique students with different academic interests ended up calling the same university home was testament to their authentic approach to the application process.
What struck me most was how the Quaker SPICES (simplicity, peace, integrity, community, equality, stewardship) were so organically instilled in our students, including these three. Thomas reminds me of how floored he was when I suggested Stanford as a great match for him. And, Michele and Daisy were similarly modest. When you have three bright examples of BFS students who not only put their best foot forward in the college application process, but in all that they do, the work we collectively do with them is not only rewarding but refreshing and energizing as well.
While we are proud of all of our students and recognize the pure coincidence of these three having chosen Stanford, what stands out most is how their lives have been, and continue to be, shaped by what they learned here at BFS. While we can never fully emulate the world for our students, they can and bring more of BFS into the larger world.
Thomas and Michelle, at what age did you enter BFS?
Thomas: I started at Brooklyn Friends in Kindergarten.
Michelle: I started at the Upper School.
What was your transition to BFS like?
Thomas: I don't remember much about my transition, since I was very young—I do remember liking the graham crackers they gave us in my kindergarten class.
Michelle: I was very fortunate to meet some incredible girls during the pre-season volleyball practices the summer before my freshman year. They made transitioning into BFS much easier, since we shared similar backgrounds and goals. We were able to help each other with issues in school and at home. I could not have asked for better friends.
What teachers had a profound effect on your experience at BFS?
Thomas: In history, Ed Herzman and Jesse Klausz; in science, Travis Merritt and Kristen Baldiga; and in English, Sidney Bridges.
Michelle: Vladimir Malukoff (my advisor), Julien Remy (my 9th-10th grade dean, 11th-12th grade dean, and IB HL Math teacher), and Vanessa Aird (my faculty advisor for the Panthers Supreme Dance Team) were wonderfully supportive throughout my time at BFS. Not only did Vlad keep me updated every morning with current events, providing historical context where necessary, he always lightened the mood with his banter. Julien never failed to make me feel welcomed at BFS, and it was very fun and challenging (in the best way possible) to be taught by someone who also really loved and had a deep appreciation for math. Vanessa always pushed me to be my best self, both in academics and the Panthers Supreme Dance Team. I believe that her confidence in me made me feel like I could be confident in myself as well.
What advice would you give current students at BFS?
Thomas: I would say don't worry about what the "right" extra-curricular activities are for getting into college (my mom worries about this a lot). Instead pick things you're interested in, no matter what they are and really commit to them; in the classroom I would say be curious—ask every question you have and don't be afraid to keep asking questions if you're not satisfied with the answer to your first one.
Michelle: Try not to lose sight of the issues/matters that are important to you, whether they be activism, arts, sports, etc. Life is hard enough, so you might as well do more of what brings you joy and/or a sense a purpose. On a more career-oriented standpoint, college admissions really care about you as a contributor to society. Scores and grades matter, but so do your character and potential to be a leader in your field(s).
What's next, now that you've graduated?
Thomas: I've spent the summer playing music in Nashville with a band I started in college. Next month I'll be moving back to NYC and finding work and a place to live.
Michelle: I am currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Biomedical Informatics at Harvard Medical School. I am excited to make use of my love for math and computer science to tackle some of today's most pressing medical issues, like drug resistance.
Finally, how did the Quaker education you received at BFS prepare and guide you for your studies at Stanford, on a micro and macro level? For example, daily life and challenges, as well as the larger issues of growing up, being away from home, and navigating the world of the university for the first time?
Thomas:I think all the Wednesday afternoons I spent sitting in silence at BFS gave me an appreciation for the importance of being a good listener, and some sense of how to be one. When I first got to college, I was definitely a little intimidated by the academic environment and shy about speaking in class. So I got really good at participating in class, just as a listener first, and that helped make me a better student, classmate and scholar down the road. But maybe more importantly – in my social life – I've found that being a good listener has made me a better friend and leader. College is a time of rapid personal growth and change for a lot of people and being a good listener for my friends helped me navigate that personal growth in myself.
Michelle:These are great questions. I had to think about them for a bit. I believe the Quaker education inherently tries to cultivate mindfulness, both towards others and in ourselves. It has certainly helped me put the challenges of college – like navigating through difficult coursework and making new friends – into perspective, so that I would not get as easily overwhelmed. Also, being in the habit of reflecting upon my experiences has kept me grounded, in a way that reminds me to prioritize accordingly. That's one of the strategies I have used to avoid spreading myself too thin or being too hard on myself for making certain decisions. It doesn't always work because I am a bit of a workaholic and perfectionist. Now, in terms of being mindful towards others — I really value taking the time to give my closest friends the space they need to vent and actually be listened to, as corny as that sounds. It's helped me find my closest friends at BFS, whom I still stay in touch with to this day, and at Stanford.
Be curious – ask every question
you have and don't be afraid
to keep asking questions
if you're not satisfied
with the answer to your first one. –Thomas
College admissions really care about you as a contributor to society. Scores and grades matter, but so do your character and potential to be a leader in your field. –Michelle
« Battle of the Panthers – Blue vs. Red on Nov. 26 at Barclays Center
Mixing It Up in the Middle School »

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Home biography Sarah Disanto
Sarah Disanto Biography
Facts of Sarah Disanto
Sarah DiSanto
Nate Parker's wife
Nate Parker (m. 2007)
Quick Timeline of Sarah Disanto
1999 Began dating Nate Parker
2007 Married to Nate Parker
2016 Net Worth around $3 million
Detail Timeline of Sarah Disanto
Began dating Nate Parker
Sarah Disanto completed her high school education from somewhere in United States and then she joined Pennsylvania State University. While she was there, she met love of her life Nate Parker. They began their live affairs when they were still at Pennsylvania State University.
Married to Nate Parker
After being in love for several years, Sarah Disanto and Nate Parker decided to enter into the new stage of their love life. After years of love life, they finally got married in 2007. As a loving spouse, they have already been parents three times.
Net Worth around $3 million
Sarah Disanto is a Wife of famous actor Nate Parker and is married together for a long time. Regarding Sarah's economic aspect, she runs a lavish and glamorous lifestyle through her earning. Her net worth is estimated to be around $3 Millions.
Young and beautiful lady, Sarah Disanto is mainly popular for being the wife of a famous actor, a director, and producer, Nate Parker. Nate Parker is also a writer and musical performer. The couple enjoys a healthy marital life.
Early Life And Education
Sarah Disanto was born in Pennsylvania, United States. Her ethnicity is white and her nationality is American.
CAPTION: Sarah Disanto SOURCE: Bossip
Sarah Disanto completed her high school education in the United States, after which she joined Pennsylvania State University for further studies.
Sarah Married Life With Husband Nate Parker
While Sarah Disanto was at Pennsylvania State University, she met her now boyfriend-turned-husband Nate Parker. They began dating and having a romantic love affair when they were still at Pennsylvania State University.
After years of love life, they finally got married in 2007 and ever since they are enjoying a happy marital relationship together. As a loving spouse, they have already been parents to four children.
The couple is happily married together with no hints of a divorce.
Sarah Disanto's husband Nate Parker
Sarah Disanto's husband, Parker is the nominee of the Black Reel Award and Image Awards. As an actor, Parker is famous for his role in movies like Beyond the Lights, Red Tails, The Secret Life of Bees and many others.
Sarah Disanto Is A Millionaire
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# Nate Parker
# American millionaire celebrity
# Celebrity Spouse
# Sarah Disanto


This townhouse style condo in the desirable Ellinwood Park community is in a park like setting with ponds and water features throughout. It is in a quiet, peaceful environment that seems a world away yet it is within walking distance of restaurants and shopping. Freeway access is a short drive away and the P.H. Bart is easily accessible. The interior has been recently painted, the kitchen has a new stove and microwave, and the refrigerator and dishwasher are almost new. The carpet upstairs is brand new, the downstairs has wood laminate. There is a cozy fireplace in the living room and a stackable washer and dryer in the attached garage. There is a good sized front patio and deck off of the master bedroom.
Listing courtesy of Lou Ritthaler of Windermere Diablo Realty.


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The Penn Stater Magazine
Posts tagged 'Marianne Alexander'
Trustees Struggle to Find Consensus on Board Reform
Perhaps in this case, the best place to start is the end.
Two hours into the Board of Trustees' governance and long-range planning committee meeting Thursday afternoon in Hershey, chair Keith Eckel decided the group needed another session before its next scheduled meeting in May. The board's governance consultant, Holly Gregory, agreed and pushed for a substantial chunk of time to find some consensus on what reforms to pursue—and to understand why those reforms are needed.
"We need to drill down," Gregory said. "I'm still really, really challenged because I need to make sure we have a sense of what we are trying to move on. And it's difficult to come up with ideas of what we're going to do when we don't know what we're trying to achieve. That was my hope. I have some sense of that on the size (of the board) issue, but we haven't had the time to go down as deep as I'd like."
Then she added, "I'm supposed to help facilitate. Not come up with my own reform proposal. I can easily come up with one based on what I've heard, but that really isn't the task as I understand that."
The committee members and Penn State staff pulled out their calendars and started tossing out suggestions. None worked. (Perhaps a suggestion from the media seats—why not do a Doodle poll?—would have helped.) These are busy people, people with calendars full of other board meetings, vacations, grandchildren. The upcoming celebration of Penn State's capital campaign took up a few days, as did the ag trustees election and the counting of alumni election votes. At one point, Anthony Lubrano '82, one of the board's most vocal critics, even after joining it, noted a week he was unavailable, prompting Jim Broadhurst '64, an executive committee member and former board chair who has served since 1998, to quip, "Might be a good week to have it, then."
Everyone laughed, even Lubrano, who said, "I gave you a softball, Jim—if you couldn't hit that one …"
Consensus was almost impossible to find. They tentatively settled on May 7, the day before the officially scheduled governance committee meeting, and according to attorney Frank Guadagnino '78, responding to a question from Jesse Arnelle '55, '62g, that meeting should be open to the public.
It's no secret, of course, that Penn State's board is divided and that proceeding on the next part of governance reform, which involves the size and composition of the board, plus qualifications for trustees, was going to be difficult. That's why the governance committee said it hired Gregory, to help members find the right path.
The board's stated intent is to vote on a reform package in the fall. But the trustees entered Thursday's meeting, their first public discussion on reform with Gregory, having not yet determined which data they needed or which universities they wanted to use as benchmarks. After a lengthy back-and-forth, that was settled. (And if they want more data, they are welcome to check out a feature from our July/August 2012 issue in which we compared the size and composition of Penn State's board to those of other Big Ten, land-grant, and Pennsylvania universities.)
Even a potential reform that has widespread support—the addition of a permanent student trustee, necessary because there's no guarantee of student representation, only a tradition that a student is of the six trustees appointed by the governor—required a sustained, sometimes contentious, discussion.
The issue has some urgency because the current student trustee, Peter Khoury, is graduating in May, and the board realized that unless it acts, it could be without a student representative when tuition is set at its July meeting. Eckel said Gov. Tom Corbett has assured that he will select Khoury's successor in plenty of time to have the selection ratified by the state senate, but the committee wanted a back-up plan in case that doesn't work.
The plan: for the committee to vote on the permanent student trustee reform immediately, but bring the item to the full board for the necessary approval only if the process in place now hasn't moved forward by the next meeting. There's a chance that the full board will not vote on this in May. But this action separated the student trustee from the rest of the reform package, which does not yet exist.
The student trustee position involves three changes: The size of the board would increase from 32 members to 33 (both numbers include non-voting trustees) because the governor would still have six appointments. The board itself would select the student trustee, but the University Park Undergraduate Association, the Graduate Student Association, and the Council of Commonwealth Student Governments would recommend that student. And the student trustee term would be two years, not three, to make it less likely that students would have to choose a freshman.
Barbara Doran '75 suggested that Khoury stay on, that he could still represent student interests as an extremely recent graduate. (His term doesn't officially expire until November; he has agreed to resign to make way for a student-chosen trustee.) The committee's student representative, Molly Droelle, the president of CCSG, said that is unacceptable to students: "That's a very strong point for us."
Vice president for administration Tom Poole told the committee that the governor makes his decision after student organizations recommend one or two candidates and the state secretary of education (also a trustee) interviews the candidates. Richard Dandrea '77 noted that the board could decide to make the student trustee position permanent but officially designate that trustee as one of the governor's appointees.
"Not in the eyes of the students," Droelle said. "That's not the proposal."
"I know that's in the eyes of the students," Dandrea said. "I like your vigorous advocacy. I'll write your recommendation for law school. But I'm just saying, that's another alternative we should consider."
That idea was discussed but never brought forth for official consideration.
Lubrano objected to the item because it was separated from other potential reforms and because while the issue of the student trustee has been discussed generally in committee, he hadn't seen this official proposal until the meeting. He insisted on a roll call vote, and the proposal passed 8-1, with his dissent.
"It's imprudent to move forward with one part without talking about the whole," he said.
Dealing with that whole, however, is proving difficult. And the proverbial devil, it became clear as the meeting progressed, is not only in the details, but in the overall philosophies of board members.
Board reform became a hot topic after the Sandusky scandal, when the board was criticized for its actions, particularly not knowing that Jerry Sandusky was under investigation before he was charged, the decision to fire Joe Paterno and how it was carried out, and the handling of the Freeh report. Alumni trustee Marianne Ellis Alexander '62, who was on the board in 2011 and is not running for re-election, addressed that issue head-on late in Thursday's meeting.
She referenced a report by the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges from the late 2000s that cited Penn State's board as a model of good governance because of the diversity of constituencies represented on the board (alumni, agriculture, business, state officials) and the diversity of ways in which they are chosen (direct election, self-selection, appointees).
"I don't want to lose sight of that," she said. "And also, since eight years ago … there's been a steady evolution toward board reform that means every member of this board is more included and feels more engaged. Really, it's been a revolution.
"And I think what we are doing here today is on a continuum. I just don't want us to lose sight of that. Just because we had a terrible thing happen, suddenly we have this terrible system. I don't believe that."
Doran, a private wealth manager at Morgan Stanley who was elected by the alumni post-scandal, answered by citing the nation's financial crisis of 2008. "Most of the banks concerned were very well run, had risk management systems, everything looked good—and then fell apart when they failed the ultimate stress test. … A stress came (to Penn State), and it hurt us. Wall Street has been undergoing massive reform. I think that's where we are now. We need to continue to look at how to improve."
Alexander, one of two voting members of the board with a higher education background, responded, "I don't like the idea of Penn State being compared to those financial institutions."
Replied Doran, "It's out there."
The back-and-forth called back to how Gregory began her section of the meeting, which was billed on the agenda as "facilitated discussion of governance considerations with consultant."
She said: "We need to ask, 'Is change likely to have a positive result on board effectiveness?' And also, perception matters here—you govern in public, and having the support of the community is critically important. … I think we have to deal with both issues."
Those issues have many parts. I'm planning to flesh out some of them in future posts.
Lori Shontz, senior editor
March 7, 2014 at 11:56 am Lori Shontz	1 comment
One More Update from the BOT
You can read most of our updates from Friday's Board of Trustees meeting on this post from Friday evening, but here are a few more for your Monday morning:
—Presidential search update: Board chair Keith Masser '73 opened the meeting with an update on the presidential search process, which was rebooted in November. He said simply that the process is continuing and that "we are on pace to name the next president of Penn State in the months ahead."
There is a deadline: President Rod Erickson is retiring at the end of June. Or, as he put it two Saturdays ago when a reporter at the news conference introducing James Franklin asked Erickson if he had any update on the search: "My last day of work is June 30, 2014."
Click here for a piece by Charlie Thompson of The Patriot-News that gets a little more in-depth on the search.
—A new Joe Paterno statue: Joel Myers '61, '63g, '71g, chair of the outreach committee, didn't have a committee meeting to report about Friday; the outreach committee meeting was off the agenda (along with the student life committee meeting) to allow enough time for a retreat with governance consultant Holly Gregory. Myers did ask if he could read a brief statement. The topic: that it is time to unite the various factions of Penn Staters.
That's a theme Myers has sounded periodically, but this time, he quoted Abraham Lincoln ("A house divided cannot stand …") and proposed that "now is the time" for there to be a statue of Fred Lewis Pattee and Joe Paterno to be erected in front of the library. The Centre Daily Times has full coverage with a story and text of the speech.
—BOT nominations continuing: There's still plenty of time—until Feb. 26—for alumni to submit their nominations for one of the three alumni seats up for election in 2014. (If you're a member of the Penn State Alumni Association or have donated to the university within the past two years, you should have received a nomination form in your email. If you're an alum and would like to request one, click here.)
Mike Dawson '02 of the Centre Daily Times checked in with the three incumbents—Myers, Jesse Arnelle '55, '62g, and Marianne Ellis Alexander '62—during the meeting to ask whether they are running for re-election; all said they hadn't decided yet. None of the alumni trustees who were on the board in November 2011 have been re-elected.
January 20, 2014 at 9:07 am Lori Shontz	Leave a comment
More on Governance Reform at Penn State
It appears, more and more, that change in the structure of the Board of Trustees will not end with the removal of the university president and governor as voting members and the other reforms enacted in May. The governance and long-range planning committee, which recommended the May changes, plans to hire a governance consultant by the board's November meeting. This consultant would help the governance committee to determine what further changes should be referred to the entire board.
This process is moving quickly. Keith Eckel (pictured here) suggested that a consultant was needed in July—his first meeting as chair of the committee–just two months ago.
At Thursday afternoon's committee meeting, Eckel reported that he, board chair Keith Masser '73, and Barbara Doran '75—a subcommittee, I'd note, that incorporates both a veteran and a new member of the board—had reviewed about a dozen possibilities and narrowed the field to four or five people. Doran said they had solicited recommendations for the position "as broadly and widely as we could."
The idea that Penn State needs to hire another consultant to discuss governance after already receiving reports on the subject from Louis Freeh, former auditor general Jack Wagner, and Penn State's Faculty Senate has sparked anger and some ridicule among critics of the board. But Eckel said the trustees are not looking for another informational report.
"We want a top expert in the field, but we also want a facilitator, because obviously a number of these issues don't have unanimous agreement," he said.
Eckel, Masser, and Doran want to get some additional information on the remaining candidates, they said, and are planning to bring the full committee together again to interview the candidates as soon as possible. Their goal is to have made a hire by the board's November meeting. Eckel called the timetable "aggressive," but no one at the meeting objected to it.
Eckel, who talks and explains more in committee than his predecessor, Jim Broadhurst '65, did, also gave what seems to be his mission statement going forward:
"We can't emphasize enough, the improvement of our governance is a work in progress," he said. "There are a number of areas that need to be looked at, need to be reconciled.
"If you're going to be world-class, each year you ought to have the entire board review the operations of the board and make suggestions for changes as well as committee operations. And, in fact, if we became very aggressive in that area, we might reach a point where the board agreed on an evaluation process of each other by every member of the board in order to create a more efficient process and higher-performing board members. That's an aggressive step.
"I'm only listing these things to indicate it will be a work in process that I don't believe is ever completed. But our goal is to have the best governance for this university."
Other notes from Thursday's governance committee meeting:
—More information on the formation of a separate compensation committee, including bylaws changes, was given by Susan Basso, vice president for human resources, and Frank Guadagnino '78, an outside attorney from Reed Smith hired by Penn State for his expertise on governance issues. This committee would help to determine salaries for several tiers of university officials, ranging from the president (its primary purpose) down through top vice presidents, the athletic director, and even some highly paid coaches.
The discussion expanded into Penn State's structure, in which Basso reports to David Gray, senior vice president for business and finance. Doran asked how this lines up with recommendations in the Freeh report and best practices at other universities.
Making human resources a separate department reporting directly to the president is a Freeh report recommendation that Penn State has decided to not follow, partly because this would give the president of the university another direct report in a time when he has many obligations, and partly because that's not how most other universities do it. (Sen. George Mitchell, who is assessing Penn State's compliance with the Freeh report as part of the NCAA-mandated Athletics Integrity Agreement, has signed off on Penn State's decision.) Guadagnino also said only one or two other universities have the structure outlined in the Freeh report.
Doran said she found the Big Ten's practices, which are consistent with Penn State's interesting, saying, "It seems that modern governance is evolving away from" having HR and finance in one department.
Marianne Ellis Alexander '62 voiced a sentiment that I've heard often around campus, but not at trustees meetings: "Freeh was using a corporate standard to apply to higher education. We are going with the best practices of higher education, and there's definitely a different model. We chose to go with the higher ed model."
—The committee also engaged in an interesting discussion about how trustees should conduct themselves in public forums, particularly if they disagree with the position the board or university has taken as a whole. Anthony Lubrano '82, of course, was the focal point of the discussion, which was nuanced and thought-provoking. I'll delve into that in a later post.
September 20, 2013 at 9:09 am Lori Shontz	4 comments
Emeritus Trustees Become Point of Contention
It's certainly not news that Penn State's Board of Trustees has some divisions:
—In the past two alumni trustee elections, candidates upset with the board's handling of the Sandusky scandal—and particularly its treatment of Joe Paterno—won election by large margins.
—Friday's election for vice chair won't be a formality, because there are two candidates, Ryan McCombie '70 and Paul Silvis '06g. Although it's not unprecedented to have an actual vote, it is rare. (And there were three candidates until Linda Brodsky Strumpf '69 withdrew Thursday morning.)
—Five of the trustees have joined the Paterno family, former Penn State football coaches and players, and Penn State faculty in a lawsuit against the NCAA.
But for a vivid example of the division—and the emotion involved—look no further than the governance and long-range planning committee's discussion Thursday afternoon at Penn State Fayette about whether to recommend two former trustees for emeritus status.
The background: Emeritus status is granted to former trustees who have "served as a board member for 12 years or more with distinction," according to the board's standing orders (click here for a PDF; scroll down to page 11 for the specific criteria considered). Making clear the role of emeritus trustees and deciding upon more specific criteria has come up in discussions about governance reform, but the issue hasn't really been discussed deeply.
On Thursday afternoon, for the first time since the scandal, the governance committee considered recommending former trustees for emeritus status. Keith Eckel, the new chair of the committee, put forth the names of the two alumni trustees who left the board in June 2012: David Jones '54, who decided to not run for reelection, and Anne Riley '64, '75g, who was defeated. Both had been on the board since 1997.
Immediately, alumni trustee Anthony Lubrano '82 spoke up.
"These two may well be qualified to receive that status from this board," he said. "But I think we would be sending the wrong message to our community if we granted them the status today when we haven't yet decided what status we give to Joe Paterno, who gave 61 years of exemplary service."
Barbara Doran '75, who just joined the board after becoming the top vote-getter in the most recent alumni trustee election, immediately backed him up. "I think it's a legitimate issue because of where the alumni are," she said. "One issue is how Joe Paterno has been treated. I know the board has said at some point in time it's going to honor Joe Paterno, but that time is not here yet. So I think this timing on this … the time now is not ideal in terms of alumni feeling about this."
The first voice for the opposing view was another alumni trustee, Marianne Ellis Alexander '62, who has been on the board since 2005: "I think it would be unfair to hold these two people hostage. … We're talking about status for people who have served on the Board of Trustees; this is a very narrow subject that we're talking about. In the case of these individuals, they've done exactly what I think would qualify them to be an emeritus trustee. Quite frankly, I think we need their help out there … for example, as ambassadors for the good of the university. I think they should be recognized. This is a separate issue from the former issue."
The discussion continued in the same vein for about 15 minutes and included a heated exchange between Lubrano and board chair Keith Masser '73 over the procedure used in May to vote on the governance reforms. Lubrano accused Masser of going back on his pledge to vote on each individual reform separately; Masser said he had provided an opportunity to do so via a procedural move to save time and added, angrily, "I fulfilled my word!"
Another new trustee, business and industry appointee Richard Dandrea '77, said he agreed with Alexander. "There's no reason to obstruct the recognition of these individuals because, Anthony, of your desire to see the recognition move at a different pace than apparently the board has decided to go."
Also weighing in was Bill Oldsey '76, another newly elected alumni trustee, who is not a member of the committee but was sitting at the end of the meeting table. It's not unusual for trustees from other committees to sit in on discussions, but they generally sit in the area provided for the public to observe, as McCombie was doing during this discussion.
Oldsey said he doesn't know Jones, but that he knows Riley well. "Anne will never stop being an ambassador for Penn State, whether she's granted emeritus status or not," he said. "She's one of the truest Penn Staters. I may not agree with every decision she's made, but she's an extraordinary Penn Stater. I don't think you can take that out of Anne Riley. It's just part of her DNA.
"Many times in business, you have to hold off on one decision to leverage what is perhaps a more important decision. This is the way things happen sometimes. The phrase holding hostage, I'm not sure is completely apropos here. I do think some of us have an extraordinarily good radar right now for how the alumni base will react to certain things. You may believe it or choose not to believe it. That's up to you. But the alumni base may not respond particularly well. We have to decide as a board whether we care or not."
After a little more back-and-forth about the qualifications for and duties of an emeritus trustee, Oldsey's statement prompted Jim Broadhurst '65, the former committee chair, to weigh in on behalf of Riley:
"I hate to do this," he began. "But you can't know her that well in that you don't know how important this distinction is to her. I have never, in my many years on the board, ever seen anyone up for this status that was so anticipating that occurring in her life." Broadhurst turned to address Oldsey directly. "You ought to go talk to her about it, see how important it is to her. It's extremely important."
Broadhurst talked a bit about how the role of an emeritus trustee has changed; they are less involved than they were in the past, and the board is still considering exactly what the emeritus trustees' role will be in the future. He talked about what Riley has done for Penn State, how she teaches classes and has been helping oversee the restoration of the Land Grant Frescos in Old Main. He pointed out that in the past, trustees qualified for emeritus status received it within months—at the meeting after their final board meeting—but that the current contenders had been on hold for a year.
"I think to hold this up would be a travesty," he concluded. "As much respect as I have for Joe and everyone else … I feel sorry for the alumni that would be disappointed in this action, I really do."
The committee then voted on whether to recommend Riley to be named emerita trustee. Lubrano voted no loudly and said he would like his vote "absolutely recorded." Doran voted no as well, but she did so silently, by raising her hand, and Tom Poole '84g, the board's secretary, made sure to clarify what the final vote was. It was 5-2.
The committee next considered Jones, and while the discussion was shorter and less passionate, it followed the same basic framework. The vote was the same, too: 5-2 in favor of recommending emeritus status for Jones. Among its other business Friday—including approving a tuition increase and electing a vice chair—the full board will vote on the recommendations.
July 12, 2013 at 7:03 am Lori Shontz	17 comments
PS4RS Sweeps Alumni Election–And Other Board of Trustees Notes
Barbara Doran was the top vote-getter in the alumni trustees election.
Here's the short version of Friday's Board of Trustees meeting:
The university president and governor are no longer voting members of the board. The governance reform package passed after minimal discussion, a back-and-forth between trustee Anthony Lubrano '82 and Stephen Dunham, vice president and general counsel, about what, exactly, would constitute a breach of fiduciary duty that could prompt the removal of a trustee. Lubrano, who did not seem satisfied with the answers, voted no.
And the three alumni trustee candidates endorsed by Penn Staters For Responsible Stewardship—Barbara Doran '75, William Oldsey '76, and Ted Brown '68—dominated the election. Each of their vote totals—15,085 for Doran, 13,940 for Oldsey, and 11,403 for Brown—more than doubled the total of the fourth-place finisher, incumbent Paul Suhey '79, who had 4,521 votes.
Bill Oldsey finished second.
(Penn State announced the results by candidate number, not in order of votes received, so they're hard to read. Click here to read the results in order, courtesy of the Centre Daily Times.)
The longer version? That's more complex, and something that's going to play out over the coming months.
Several trustees made a point of saying that the governance package passed today isn't the final word on reform. And the PS4RS sweep means that a growing number of people critical of how the board has handled the Sandusky scandal are now on the board itself. The board will also need to elect a new vice chair, because Stephanie Nolan Deviney '97g was not re-elected, and the standing committee assignments could change, too.
Each of the winners, who will join the board in July, spoke afterward about issues that go beyond how Joe Paterno was treated by the university. Oldsey, who has spent his career in educational publishing, stressed that both he and Penn State were in the same business—"the business of education"—and mentioned World Campus, in particular, as an area of emphasis. Brown talked of the importance of commonwealth campuses and the need to pay faculty and staff better to recruit top talent. And Doran spoke of the need for term limits for trustees and her frustration that longtime members of the board were essentially grandfathered in on the 12-year limit.
Ted Brown finished third in the alumni election.
All three also stressed the need to build relationships with the current board members, which they said was the best way to make change happen, and the importance of making current board members understand that PS4RS is not a fringe group.
"They've dismissed PS4 as this militant radical group, Franco Harris '72 is crazy, all this kind of thing," Doran said. "It's much deeper than that. I've been on the (capital) campaign for five years; I know all sorts of donors. And when you're running for the board and people think you have a shot at it you hear from a lot of people who feel it's safe to speak up."
Lubrano said afterward that the alumni trustees may begin caucusing together—and that all nine alumni trustees would be invited, although he wasn't sure all would attend. That would include the three alumni trustees who were on the board during the Sandusky scandal, and whose terms expire in 2014: Marianne Ellis Alexander '62; Jesse Arnelle '55, '62g; and Joel Myers '61, '63g, '71g.
Other notes from the meeting:
—The election of agricultural trustees and selection of business and industry trustees also took place. Incumbent Keith Eckel will be joined by M. Abraham Harpster '94, co-owner of Evergreen Farms in Spruce Creek, Pa. Karen Bretherick Peetz '77 received another term as a business and industry trustee; she'll be joined by Richard Dandrea '77, a Pittsburgh attorney.
—After it became clear over the past week that the governance reforms would be voted on as a package, board chair Keith Masser '73 received some criticism, given that he had indicated in testimony before the legislature that the reforms would be voted on individually. (He said the same to me after the March meeting.) He attempted to find a middle way during the meeting, announcing that there was a parliamentary procedure that would allow trustees to make a motion to exclude a provision from the vote. No one took advantage of it.
Masser said after the meeting that he shouldn't have said that each change to the bylaws, standing orders, and university charter—there were dozens—would get an individual up-or-down vote. "It was impractical," he said. "I wasn't thinking when I made that statement. But that wasn't really the intent of the question. The intent of the question was 'Are you going to railroad this package through?' That's what I heard, and I wanted to be clear that no, we're not railroading the package through."
—Dunham, the university counsel, responded forcefully when questioned by Lubrano about the circumstances under which a trustee could be removed from the board. Lubrano pressed Dunham about whether the university had compared its proposed policy to those of other Big Ten universities and to define exactly what would constitute a breach of fiduciary duty.
Dunham said he thought that criticism of the provision was based on an earlier draft, which was linked to a code of conduct. "Including yourself, Trustee Lubrano, you talked about the 'Lubrano rule,' started talking about the code of conduct. That's changed. This … clearly does not relate to any individual trustee, any individual." And then, pausing after each word for emphasis, Dunham added: "It. Just. Could. Not. Be. More. Clear."
—While the public comment section (moved to earlier in the meeting for the first time) had its usual complement of people who chastised the trustees for their response to the Sandusky scandal and/or asked for more board engagement with the public, a broader range of issues came up Friday. Prominent among them: the controversial gas pipeline to the West Campus Steam Plant, which is to be converted from a coal-burning plant.
Residents of State College protested the route for the pipeline, through a residential area, and Columbia Gas has since agreed to start over and work with Penn State to study other possible routes, including through campus. Trustee Myers commented afterward: "There is a feeling by some people in town that the university is arrogant, and I think we need to bend over backwards to articulate what we plan to do and get buy-in for these kinds of things."
May 3, 2013 at 9:14 pm Lori Shontz	11 comments
Trustees Talk Search
Trustee Jim Broadhurst talks about the coming presidential search.
Penn State trustees hope to have a new university president announced by about January 2014, six months before current president Rod Erickson retires.
Jim Broadhurst '65, chair of the trustees' committee on governance and long-range planning, outlined a proposed search process during the trustees' meeting today at University Park. His committee will spend time during the trustees' next two meetings (September and November) working through the details of the search process, with the hope of launching the search around the time of the January meeting.
"It'd be important to complete the search approximately five to six months prior to the expected date that the next president would take office," Broadhurst said. "And the actual search could conceivably take up to a year. This would mean that by no later than (more…)
August 26, 2012 at 5:57 pm Tina Hay	3 comments
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Even the latest edition of my World Atlas of Wine fails to give a dedicated map page to the Spanish areas of Bierzo, Valdeorras, Ribeira Sacra, and Monterrei, all of which fall into a fairly neat quadrant in Galicia and León just east of the better-covered Rías Baixas area. The map detail is only a matter of the next edition, given the quality of wines coming out of the region. The white grape Godello has already cemented a future on the world stage. The exciting Mencía grape associated with Bierzo and Ribeira Sacra may well be next.
Bierzo's Bodegas Peique has recently begun to develop wines from Mencía, a traditional Spanish grape, employing hand harvesting and minimal vineyard intervention practices. This $13 wine is a deep violet in color, somewhat high in alcohol at 14%, with pronounced intensity on the nose. I enjoyed aromatic notes of strawberry, raspberry, prune, violet, rose, and a deep whiff of verdant earth. This was my first Mencía, and if I can make any analogy to a grape I know better, it may be to Cabernet Franc. The Peique domain features (according to the winery web site) "iron rich soil of clay and schist with sandy granite," and my own notes read "funky earth and clay." I never use the term "funky" lightly; I mean it positively to connote integrity.
This is a young wine; I aerated it three hours. The wine is dry, with moderate acidity and tannin. Strawberry, cherry and black raspberry lead the fruit. The palate has a spicy element of clove and nutmeg with orange peel, more of the rose, licorice, and the finest treat of all, bitter dark chocolate. This chocolate is not the oaky variety; as far as I understand it the wine sees no oak of any kind, hence this is a pure chocolate note without the usual lacing of vanilla.
Chocolate is always a winning point in my book, but the Peique has also an unctuous mouthfeel, and a sustained, multi-faceted finish. The tannins at the finale were pleasantly drying, the fruit almost candied as it evaporated in my mouth. I did want a shade less alcohol. The net effect was an experience of sensory newness, which is understandable considering that we can call Mencía one of those "different" grapes. For now.
Spain will soon outgrow the standard wine atlas and require an entire volume of its own. The complexity of the land itself, its soils, its grape varieties and the energy of its winemakers demands it.


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Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer now owns the Los Angeles Clippers basketball team
It is official – former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is now the official owner of the Los Angeles Clippers basketball team. After being held up in a court battle between the league and outgoing owner Donald Sterling, Ballmer believes the purchase of the LA Clippers is "the best path" for him to take.
"It was my dream to have a team in Seattle," said former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. "I spent some time on that and worked on it and I wish that had worked. I don't know when that will happen. With luck, maybe it happens in the next few years, but if it takes a few more than that, I decided that this was probably the best path for me to take."
Ballmer apparently has no immediate plans to relocate the team to Seattle. According to Ballmer, the NBA would never allow it and he paid the $2 billion price since the Clippers are a Los Angeles based team. But, Ballmer remains optimistic about Seattle having its own team too some day. "It is really unfortunate that the greatest city in America doesn't have a professional basketball team. And so, I still hope that happens."
"Probably most people will tell you I paid an L.A. beachfront price, not a Seattle beachfront price for the team," Ballmer added. "I'm not crazy." Ballmer paid $2 billion for the purchase of the team.
BREAKING: Steve Ballmer is the owner of the @LAClippers
— Bloomberg TV (@BloombergTV) August 12, 2014
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Cocke County is a county on the eastern border of the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 census, the population was 35,999. Its county seat is Newport. Cocke County comprises the Newport, TN Micropolitan Statistical Area, which is part of the Knoxville-Morristown-Sevierville, Tennessee Combined Statistical Area.

History
Before the arrival of European settlers, the area that is now Cocke County probably was inhabited by the Cherokee. They were the most recent of a series of indigenous cultures who had occupied this country for thousands of years.

The first recorded European settlement in the county was in 1783 when land near the fork of the French Broad and the Pigeon Rivers was cleared and cultivated. The earliest European settlers were primarily Scots-Irish, Dutch, and Germans who came to the area over the mountains from the Carolinas or through Virginia from Pennsylvania and other northern states.

The county was established by an Act of the Tennessee General Assembly on October 9, 1797, from a part of Greene County, Tennessee. It was named after  William Cocke, one of the state's first Senators. Located within the Appalachian and Great Smoky Mountains, it had difficult conditions for early settlers.

Like many East Tennessee counties, settled by yeomen farmers, Cocke County was largely pro-Union on the eve of the Civil War. In Tennessee's Ordinance of Secession referendum on June 8, 1861, the county's residents voted 1,185 to 518 against secession.

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of , of which  are land and  (1.9%) are covered by water. The southern part of the county is located within the Great Smoky Mountains, and the lands are protected by the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The northern part of the county is situated within the Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians. The county's highest point is Old Black, which rises to  in the Smokies along the county's border with North Carolina.  English Mountain, a large ridge that peaks at , dominates the western part of the county.

Cocke County is drained by the French Broad River, which traverses the northern part of the county and forms much of its boundary with Jefferson County. A portion of this river is part of Douglas Lake, an artificial reservoir created by Douglas Dam further downstream.  The Pigeon River flows northward across the county and empties into the French Broad north of Newport at Irish Bottoms.

Adjacent counties
Hamblen County (north)
Greene County (northeast)
Madison County, North Carolina (east)
Haywood County, North Carolina (south)
Sevier County (southwest)
Jefferson County (northwest)

National protected areas
 Appalachian Trail (part)
 Cherokee National Forest (part)
 Foothills Parkway (part)
 Great Smoky Mountains National Park (part)

State protected areas
Rankin Wildlife Management Area (part)
Martha Sundquist State Forest

Major highways

 SR 73

Demographics

2020 census

As of the 2020 United States census, there were 35,999 people, 14,060 households, and 9,196 families residing in the county.

2000 census
As of the census of 2000, 33,565 people, 13,762 households, and 9,715 families were residing in the county.  The population density was 77 people per square mile (30/km2).  The 15,844 housing units averaged 36 per mi2(14/km2).  The racial makeup of the county was 96.16% White, 1.99% African American, 0.40% Native American, 0.15% Asian,  0.33% from other races, and 0.96% from two or more races. About 1.05% of the population was Hispanic or Latino of any race.

Of the 13,762 households, 29.50% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 53.10% were married couples living together, 13.00% had a female householder with no husband present, and 29.40% were not families. About 25.70% of all households were made up of individuals, and 10.10% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older.  The average household size was 2.41 and the average family size was 2.87.

In the county, the population was distributed as 22.80% under the age of 18, 8.30% from 18 to 24, 28.80% from 25 to 44, 26.40% from 45 to 64, and 13.60% who were 65 years of age or older.  The median age was 39 years. For every 100 females, there were 94.60 males.  For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 92.80 males.

The median income for a household in the county was $25,553, and for a family was $30,418. Males had a median income of $26,062 versus $18,826 for females. The per capita income for the county was $13,881.  About 18.70% of families and 22.50% of the population were below the poverty line, including 31.80% of those under age 18 and 18.70% of those age 65 or over.

Communities

City
Newport, county seat

Town and Census Designated Place
Parrottsville
Cosby

Unincorporated communities

 Allen Grove
 Baltimore
 Boomer
 Briar Thicket
 Bridgeport
 Bybee
 Cosby
 Del Rio
 Hartford
 Liberty Hill
 Midway
 Tom Town
 Wasp

Notable residents
Ben W. Hooper, governor of Tennessee from 1911 to 1915
Popcorn Sutton, moonshiner
Marshall Teague, actor

In popular culture

The novel Christy and the television series of the same name are based on historical events, people, and localities of Cocke County. The fictional small town of El Pano, where the novel begins, is based on the existing village of Del Rio, Tennessee.  The fictional Cutter Gap, where most of the plot unfolds, represents the locale now known as Chapel Hollow.  Several area landmarks associated with the story are marked for visitors, including the site of the Ebenezer Mission in Chapel Hollow, which is located off the Old Fifteenth Rd., about  from Del Rio.

Politics

Like all of Unionist East Tennessee, Cocke County has been overwhelmingly Republican ever since the Civil War. Since the first postwar election in 1868, Cocke County has voted for every Republican presidential candidate, even supporting William Howard Taft during the divided 1912 election. No Democratic presidential candidate has managed to receive forty percent of the county's vote in this time, although Franklin D. Roosevelt in his 1932 landslide got within 0.23 percent of this figure.

See also
National Register of Historic Places listings in Cocke County, Tennessee

References

Further reading
 Goodspeed Publishing Company, "History of Cocke County", pages 864–867 in History of Tennessee, 1887. Retrieved November 26, 2006.
 Walker, E.R. III. Cocke County, Tennessee: Pages from the Past. Charleston: The History Press (2007).

External links

 Official site
 Cocke County Partnership – Chamber of Commerce
 Cocke County Schools
 Cocke County, TNGenWeb – genealogy resources

1797 establishments in Tennessee
Populated places established in 1797
Counties of Appalachia
Second Amendment sanctuaries in Tennessee
East Tennessee

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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Biblical Hermeneutics Meta
Biblical Hermeneutics Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for professors, theologians, and those interested in exegetical analysis of biblical texts. It only takes a minute to sign up.
In Judges 11:39-40 did Jephthah actually sacrifice his daughter?
It's clear that what Jephthah intended was to sacrifice the first animal that he met when he returned home:
Then the spirit of the Lord came upon Jephthah. He marched through Gilead and Manasseh, passing Mizpeh of Gilead; and from Mizpeh of Gilead he crossed over [to] the Ammonites. And Jephthah made the following vow to the Lord: "If you deliver the Ammonites into my hands, then whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me on my safe return from the Ammonites shall be the Lord's and shall be offered by me as a burnt offering."—Judges 11:29-31 (NJPS)
So when it comes time to follow trough on his promise with his daughter, the text says:
After two months' time, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. She had never known a man. So it became a custom in Israel for the maidens of Israel to go every year, for four days in the year, and chant dirges for the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.—Judges 11:39-40 (NJPS)
It seems clear that she was, in fact, offered as a burnt offering in violation of Leviticus 20:2 and Deuteronomy 18:10. Wikipedia, however, notes:
According to the commentators of the rabbinic Jewish tradition, Jepthah's daughter was not sacrificed, but was forbidden to marry and remained a spinster her entire life, fulfilling the vow that she would be devoted to the Lord.
And cites as a source:
Radak, Book of Judges 11:39; Metzudas Dovid ibid
Can this position be supported by the text or is it a pious reading intended to clear Jephthah of wrong-doing?
judges sacrifice
Ruminator
Jon Ericson♦Jon Ericson
I'll answer this more tonight. One thing that supporters of the non-death sacrifice (i.e. that she never married) cite is that she says, "I will go to bewail my virginity." She doesn't bewail her coming death, but the fact that she never married. More to come. :)
– Frank Luke
See also: Did Jephthah sacrifice his daughter?
– Jon Ericson ♦
Related article.
In support of the human sacrifice theory, Kaiser in Hard Sayings of the Bible says:
People, even servants of God, do horrid things. This era was very corrupt and there is no reason to see Jephthah as substantially different than his contemporaries.
The sacrifice of his daughter is the most natural way to interpret the text. Gleason Archer (who opposes this view) states that the term for "burnt offering" is 'ola and always elsewhere means a blood sacrifice wholly consumed on the altar by fire.
Early writers all understood this as a human sacrifice. The idea of perpetual virginity is not found until the Middle Ages.
It is alleged that the grammar of 11:31 allows only human sacrifice coming from the house not an animal.
Some of the supporters of a non-death sacrifice are Gleason Archer in A Survey of Old Testament Introduction and Keil & Delitzsch in Commentary on the Old Testament.
To summarize their arguments (and those of others),
Human sacrifice was always understood from the days of Abraham onward to be an offense and an abomination. It had been denounced and forbidden in Lev 18:21; 20:2-5; Dt 12:31; 18:10. There is no evidence of Israelites offering human sacrifice until the days of Ahaz.
His daughter went for two months to the mountains to bewail her virginity, not the coming loss of life. Though some argue that this should be read as "youth" instead of "virginity," K&D show that the terms are not interchangable. Also, she goes to the mountains to mourn. K&D say that were she mourning her youth, that could be done in town, but bewailing her virginity required that she leave town.
It is stated in verse 39 after Jephthah had performed his "burnt offering" that "she knew not a man." Such wording would be inane and heartless if she had died but is appropriate if she was devoted to service at the tabernacle. There are other examples of such women in Scripture; Ex 28:8; 1 Sam 2:22; and Luke 2:36,37. The pathos here lies not in the daughter's devotion to divine service but in the extinction of Jephthah's line as she is his only child. Both he and she bewailed her virginity.
There is no condemnation of Jephthah's act even though Gideon's heathen acts are condemned.
She was considered a heroine and the women of Israel celebrated her. It is unlikely they would have done so had she volunteered for a pagan ceremony. However, most translations take lthannoth as "lament" or variations thereof. Archer says it can be taken along the lines of celebration. Brown, Driver, Briggs Lexicon points out that this is modern and older versions (including the Septuagint) take the 11:40 as mourn. They [BDB] also point out that the word is used positively in Judges 5:11, "let them recount the victories of YHWH." Jud 5:11 and 11:40 are the only two occurrences of the word in the Hebrew Bible.
Jephthah judges Israel for 6 years afterwards. It is hard to see how the people would have stood for him leading them after this.
Kaiser concludes one way; Archer concludes another. Those are two men whom I respect very much. Personally, I conclude with Archer.
Frank LukeFrank Luke
+1 I had no idea there were such cogent arguments for the perpetual virginity position. I falsely jumped to the conclusion that it was simply a "surely not" position. I will have to think over this more but I am almost entirely persuaded.
– Kazark
When searching for the actual meaning of "virginity" in the English translations why find it out from the Hebrew of the passage? Virgin = [בתולי] -> [בתולה] , as found in the passage, vs Maiden = [עלמה] as found in Is 7:14.
– Cynthia Avishegnath
"Jephthah judges Israel for 6 years afterwards. It is hard to see how the people would have stood for him leading them after this." If it was a human sacrifice, they could have "stood for him leading" them because he stayed true to his oath, which was respectable despite the consequences. Just a thought
– A Child of God
There is no mention in the text of dedication or of the tabernacle, and so the main thing recommending an interpretation involving those things is the bewailing of virginity. I won't go so far as to say that a reading of dedication to tabernacle service is completely unwarranted; but I want to give some push back to some of the points in Frank Luke's answer because I think it's easy for our reading to be skewed in as much as we underestimate the importance the culture of Jephthah's day placed on bearing children.
There are a couple passages worth examining in this regard. Consider the lengths to which Lot's daughters are willing to go in order to bear children and preserve the family line. Or consider the feud in Genesis 29:31-30:24 where Leah and Rachel perceive not only the LORD's love towards them, but also their own sense of worth or disgrace, in relation to their ability to bear children for Jacob, to the point that Rachel demands of Jacob, "Give me children, or I'll die!"
Even accepting a dedication reading of Judges 11, one cannot fail to see the gravity with which the characters perceived the perpetual virginity of Jephthah's daughter. The prospect of it removes any rejoicing over the victory Jephthah has just won. He tears his clothes in devastation. His daughter requests two months to roam the hills and weep that she will never marry.
The narrative in Judges 21 further extends this point. The Israelites of the day prove quite willing to put to death their fellow Israelites - even for a failure to assemble - but are unwilling and grieved to let the line of the Benjamin be cut off.
So, we might read 11:39 and find "she knew not a man" to be a rather inane and heartless remark if it is in regard to someone who has just died; but would the original readers have found it so?
In my opinion, part of the narrative's contribution to the canon is to underscore the high value placed in that day on a woman's ability to bear children and continue the family line; and it does so by juxtaposing the perceived tragedy of virginity with the tragedy of death. In doing so, it serves to advance the theme of Judges, that, "In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit."
SoldarnalSoldarnal
Thanks for the push back. I appreciate it. I found it difficult to find many people supporting the human sacrifice stance today. So you're saying that the biggest tragedy of her death (as the Hebrews would see it) is that it ends her father's line?
@FrankLuke I guess I'd say the ending of her father's line would be part of the tragedy in her death, but also just that it was considered a disgrace for a woman to remain barren (cf. Gen. 30:23, Ruth 1:12-13, 1 Sam. 1:6-7, Luke 1:25) because her felt telos was bound up with providing children (esp. sons). Naomi is hopeless not because she has lost her sons (though of course she weeps for that), but because she cannot provide new sons for her daughters-in-law.
– Soldarnal
E. W. Bullinger, an Anglican theologian from the late 18oo's, shares some insightful information regarding this question: "Did Jephtha Really Sacrifice His Daughter: an Analysis of Judges 11:31."
Bullinger points out that the verse can read, ""If you deliver the Ammonites into my hands, then whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me on my safe return from the Ammonites shall be the Lord's OR shall be offered by me as a burnt offering." He says, "This is done by observing the well known rule that the connective particle [vav] is often used as a disjunctive, and means "or", when there is a second proposition." He points out the instruction in Lev. 27 for how to redeem a person (v1-8), animal (v9-13), or house (v14-15), if a man has consecrated them in a vow.
This is not a full answer of itself, and better supplements/supports the second half of Frankluke's answer. But I felt it was too rich to leave in the comment section.
+1 This point, if true, is an absolute necessity for me to accept the perpetual virgin theory. Very interesting.
– Austin
Rashi says she was killed:
and it was a statute: They decreed that no one should do this anymore (i.e., they publicized that no one should offer a human being), because had Jephthah gone to Phinehas or vice versa, he would have nullified his (i.e., Jephthah's) vow (i.e., he would have instructed him what the law is in such an instance). However, they were particular about their honor, and as a result she was destroyed. Consequently, they were punished; Phinehas, by the Divine presence leaving him as it is stated in (I) Chron. (9:20) "Previously God was with him," so we see subsequently God was not with him; and Jephthah was afflicted with boils and dismemberment as it is stated, (below 12:7) "And he was buried in the cities [pl.] of Gilead." (His limbs were buried in the various cities.) We can also interpret "And it was a statute in Israel" as connected to the following verse.
Bob JonesBob Jones
Excellent find! Not only was she killed, but if Jephthah had submitted the problem to the priest she might have been saved. Seems very reasonable, if a bit speculative. +1
@Jon Of course Jon there is a picture of Christ in it all, but I hesitate to share it.
– Bob Jones
You see Jesus everywhere. ;-) I see a connection too, but it seems like it would be reading into the text rather than reading out of it.
It is not reading into it if God intended it to be there. Jesus said all the scriptures spoke of him.
Even in the time of Josephus it was known that she was sacrificed as a burnt offering: penelope.uchicago.edu/josephus/ant-5.html#S7.10
In addition to Soldarnal's point I would like to add that there is evidence that Jephthah's dagheter's request to "mourn her virginity" was an ancient cultic rite associated with the cult of Anath and Baa'l,
The role of women in this rite is reminiscent of the part that the goddess Anat plays in mourning and searching for the dead Baal (GORDON UH 67 VI ,25-31). There is probably a reminiscence of those rites in the mourning of the virgins of Israel mentioned in the Jephthah saga (Judges xi, 37-40).
Here the author connects the weeping women of the Tammuz with the wailing virgins of Judges 37-40, for the daughter of Jephthah, as they were both supposed to re-enact the mythical death of Baal or Dumuzzi (such re-enactment was fairly common in the ANE, see here about the Sacred Marriage). It is very probable that Jephthah's daughter's request was motivated by the same desire to take part in this ancient rite to weep for the death of the Baal one last time (indeed this time she would have a good reason to cry). The author of Judges goes on to add that from then on the virgins of Israel would not only mourn the death of Baal (as they used to), but also Jephthah's daughter's death 4 times a year.
The IVP Bible Background Commentary 11:37 makes this observation,
In Canaanite mythology from Ugarit (Baal and Mot) the virgin goddess Anat roams the hills mourning for lost fertility, since Baal is dead. The motif of roaming the hills for lost fertility is therefore a possible connection with Jephthah's daughter's request.
If we suppose that this myth reflects an ancient Cannanite rite to mourn in the hills the death of Baal and the loss of Anat's virginity (in which they were supposed to re-enact their god's mythical death), then we can certainly presume that this is what Jephthah's daughter meant when she asked to let her "mourn her virginity". This will effectively explain why the daughter of Jephthah made such a fuss over her loss of virginity when she was going to be sacrificed in less than 2 months! It is not the virginity per se that she so desperately wanted to mourn, it was this ancient rite that she wanted to take part in one last time, coupled with the thought that she will not be able to bear children anymore and continue her father's family line; this time the mourning for Anat's virginity would resonate well with her.
This also explains the two month period of the weeping virgins four times a year,
The time period of two months likely correlates with one of Israel's "seasons." The Gezer calendar (tenth century) divides the year into eight periods: four of two months' length and four of one month's length. The second two-month period (for sowing) consisted of winter months when concerns about fertility would be most prominent. (The IVP Bible Commentary, Ibid)
Indeed the whole saga just reinforces the poor spiritual and moral state of the Israelites at the time; how much influenced they have become from their neighboring Cannanites, adopting their customs, and even sacrificing their children (in this case the sacrifice was to Yahweh!) and doing all that is abominable in the eyes of Yahweh.
Here is a copy of Wyatt's translation to the original Baal & Mot. Much thanks to David for showing it to me.
BachBach
The Old Testament does not shy from death as seen in the Exodus description for breaking the Ten Commandments. This seems to be a similar issue. People try to find a different view that something that is clearly stated in the Bible. Human offerings were not new at the time and was practiced in other cultures. It would be unlikely for the text to have meant something else other than what was stated at the time it was written.
Frank Luke
DonaldDonald
Welcome to Biblical Hermeneutics! I've changed a little formatting on your answer so that it fits with the rest of the site and network (i.e. the link). Thanks for answering and giving a source. Please do more.
In addition to the above we can be certain that Jephthah did not sacrifice his daughter as a literal human sacrifice because such a thing was not practiced by true worshipers of Jehovah (Yahweh). It was a characteristic of cruel pagan worship to Baal and Chemosh but not to the true God. Jehovah's view of such sacrifices is plainly seen at Jeremiah 7:31. He describes such cruelty as "a thing that I had not commanded and that had not come up into my heart." (New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures)
In view of the comments below, I might add the rendering in the Revised New World Translation (2013) that makes the text clearer:
Jephthah said: "'Oh no, my daughter! You have broken my heart, for you have become the one I have banished.'" (Judges 11:35)
"She then said to her father: 'Let this be done for me: Let me be alone for two months, and let me go away into the mountains, and let me weep with my friends because I will never marry.'" (Judges 11:37 ftn.)
"She never had relations with a man. And it became a custom in Israel: From year to year, the young women of Israel would go to give commendation to the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in the year." (Judges 11:39, 40)
The rendering here does not suggest Jephthah had in mind a literal sacrifice, but a lifetime of devotion at the Tabernacle, similar to the devotion of Samuel and to the devotion of other women (1 Samuel 1:11, 24; Exodus 38:8). Why would Jephthah's daughter weep because she would never marry, and not rather because she would die? Also, the rendering in the Revised New World Translation here differs from others when it says that the women of Israel would give commendation to her, rather than mourn her death.
For more information on this view and interpretation, follow this link: Jephthah's Vow
Ken Graham
answered May 1 '12 at 21:17
While I agree that God commanded Israel to not sacrifice their children and the Jephthah ought to have broken his vow, the text seems to indicate that he did kill his daughter. People in the Bible often do things that are cruel and wicked. So while this is an interesting comment on the question, it doesn't seem to answer it.
God did not command many things. People still did them.
-1 for committing the No True Scotsman fallacy and then reading presumptions back into the text.
– Dan
@JonEricson The pagan nations around them often practiced such cruel and wicked things, but the Bible doesn't record any other examples of faithful worshipers offering human sacrifices with divine approval, as if to imitate their example or set a precedent. In view of the fact that Paul cites Jephthah's example as one to imitate, a rendering that suggests that he performed a human sacrifice seems inconsistent. (Hebrews 11:32)
Your answer was voted down because it does not supply the requested information. The questioner is aware that it would have been wrong for Jephthah to literally make a burnt offering of his daugher and that it is hard to accept that he did so anyway. He is asking if the language of the passage allows other interpretations, such as dedication to service in the tabernacle. The quotes from the 2013 NWT which you added when you edited, but until we understand how the translation committee reached its decision, the question is still unanswered.
– David42
Interesting question!
I first read this passage in BPT09 (portuguese) which states
Dois meses decorridos, voltou para junto de seu pai. Ele fez como tinha prometido ao Senhor e ela morreu sem se ter casado. Assim teve origem o costume, que existe em Israel, de as jovens saírem quatro dias por ano, para chorarem a má sorte da filha de Jefté, de Guilead.
which translates literally to
Two months later, she returned to her father. He did as he had promised the Lord, and she died without being married. Thus originated the custom, which exists in Israel, for young girls to go out four days a year, to mourn the bad luck of Jephthah's daughter from Guilead.
So it's clear in that translation that she died.
Then, from reading Judges 11:39-40 (NASB)
39 And at the end of two months she returned to her father, who did to her what he had vowed; and she had no relations with a man. And it became a custom in Israel, 40 that the daughters of Israel went annually to commemorate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite for four days in the year.
it's unclear as to what is meant with the vow. Even though she could've been sacrificed (even though that was forbidden), the other possibility would be forbidding her to marry and hence the virginity from Judges 11:37.
Tiago Martins PeresTiago Martins Peres
This is an intriguing segment of the Scriptures.
One. Only Holy Scripture can assist us, at this time.
It is possible to defend both positions from Scriptures. However, as of right now, it is not possible to defend any position from outside Scripture.
The rabbinical text quoted by Bob Jones was written many centuries after the fact, and the author of that rabbinical text makes several grave errors. One such error is placing Jephthah in the same generation as Phinehas. Phinehas was from the time of Moses and Joshua. Jephthah lived some 300 to 400 years later.
We have no extra-biblical evidence or commentary from the days of the Judges, so far, which leaves us reliant on the Scriptures for clues to figure out what happened.
Two. Times of Renewal not Corruption.
I've read in many places that Jephthah lived in a very corrupt time-period, and that in his ignorance, or perhaps in his semi-pagan understanding, it was feasible that he might've killed his daughter.
Unfortunately for that line of argumentation, the Scriptures do not support it. On the contrary, Israel had just repented and turned to the Lord in a powerful way. Just 3 verses before Jephthah is introduced, we read this:
And the sons of Israel said to the LORD, We have sinned. Do You to us whatever is good in Your eyes; only deliver us, we pray You, today. And they put away the strange gods from among them, and served the LORD. And His soul was moved by the misery of Israel.* (Judges 10:15,16)
Finally, Jephthah's immense knowledge of Moses' and Joshua's writings lead to no other conclusion than that he knew very well that sacrificing (to death) a human would not in any way please God, and that he could offer an alternative sacrifice as provisioned in the Law (Lev. 27). His correspondence to the Ammonites in Judges 11 show his mastery of the Scriptures.
I don't claim to know what really happened, but it seems to me that he did not kill his daughter. There may have been another practice -- which involved virginity -- of which we are not aware today.
That Jewish writers, many centuries later, wrote that Jephthah did indeed kill his daughter only shows those writers' thought-patterns, not Jephthah's. Some Jewish authorities from intertestamental times made claims that the Torah existed before God and is more powerful than God, etc. It was against such people and ideas that Jesus stood against.
I hope this helps, or at least guides us in the right direction.
I personally believe the answer must be found in the Mosaic Law or in customs of the day that are unfamiliar to us. Lev. 27:2-8 seem to speak of sanctifying or dedicating people (humans), through a "special vow." This seems to indicate tabernacle service. (Yet, Samuel was sanctified in this way, and he married.) Could this be what Jephthah did, combined with some other practice of his day?
In contrast, Lev. 27:29 seems to speak of things and humans that are "devoted." And they cannot be redeemed, but put to death. Many commentators firmly believe that this is referring to pagan prisoners of war, in which case Jephthah's daughter would not qualify.
Arguments for both sides look for clues in the Hebrew of Judges 11 to know if it was a vow of "sanctifying" or "devoting."
Regardless, it seems obvious to me that something else is going on. We are missing a piece of the puzzle that is not given us. I believe she was not killed, but she was sanctified in a way that she could never be married. And this was celebrated or commemorized by Jewish women for some generations.
Peter CerqueiraPeter Cerqueira
Welcome to Biblical Hermeneutics Stack Exchange. It sounds like you have a good knowledge of Scripture; your insights will be welcome I'm sure. I noticed you said, "I've read in many places that . . . " I encourage you, instead of working from memory, to find at least one one of those sources and interact with specific points of their stance. It will strengthen your answer and add to your credibility on the forum.
Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged judges sacrifice or ask your own question.
Means of transportation in the case of Jephthah and his daughter
Did Jephthah have pets?
Does Rashi's interpretation of Jephthah's fate hold water?
Leviticus 27 - fee for service or redemption price?
Does God condone or command that Jephthah sacrifice his daughter? (Judges 11:34-39)
Who was the Gilead of Judges 11?
Could Jephthah get back his daughter?
Why did Samson hide from his parents the two incidents in Judges 14?
Which land were the Ammonites demanding in Judges 11:13?:
How did Jerome arrive at his Translation of Judges 15:8?
Judges 16:19 did Delilah torment Samson?
Did Abimelech sacrifice his brothers?
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text:
"Problematic Wi-Fi Access": Apple Bans Augmented Reality App Sekai Camera [Update]
Serkan Toto	@serkantoto / 10 years
More and more apps are stricken from the App Store as of late, for a variety of reasons. Today, the Apple hammer hit Tokyo-based Tonchidot whose augmented reality app Sekai Camera was removed without warning.
The free app, which made its – memorable – debut during TechCrunch 50 in 2008, intends to help users "tag the world" by imposing information (text, pictures, video and audio) over images in the iPhone camera.
Sekai Camera uses GPS to locate the user and measure the distance to objects in the vicinity. The problem for Apple: in places with weak GPS signals (i.e. within buildings or underground), the app relies on PlaceEngine, a technology that makes it possible to determine a user's location via Wi-Fi. Once it's installed on a device, the PlaceEngine client collects Wi-Fi signals from nearby access points and sends the information to a server, which then estimates your location.
PlaceEngine provider Koozyt says on its Japanese website Apple changed their policy regarding "the way apps access Wi-Fi devices". Not only Sekai Camera, but a number of other PlaceEngine-powered apps were kicked out, too (including Yahoo! Maps for the iPhone). Details are still unclear at this point, with Koozyt saying they are currently looking into the issue.
More information on the peculiar ban are available at The Register.
Tonchidot itself cites "issues regarding the App Store review process" as a reason for the ban of Sekai Camera version 2.1.1, adding the app will make a comeback in version 2.2 "soon". I wouldn't be too surprised to see PlaceEngine get scrapped altogether.
In Japan, Sekai Camera is the most downloaded iPhone app to date, and it was elected "Best App in 2009″ by Apple Japan late last year (it was released worldwide in December).
We reached out to Tonchidot for a comment and will update this post when we have it.
Update with Tonchidot's response (edited):
We have also received sympathetic words from many people across the
world, and really appreciate everyone's support.
We always strive to comply with Apple's policies, and will fix and
resubmit a version that satisfies their current requirements. We do
not know what the exact reason is for their recent decision, but
Koozyt, among others, have been extremely helpful in helping us
identify the potential cause.
No worries, will will have a new and better version back up on App
Store very soon, so please look forward to it ! :)
Go Koozyt! Go Sekai Camera!


text:
Q: No matching function for template class operator in C++ with .hpp and .cpp I have two files that I would like to compile. They are as follows:
Array.hpp
template<class T> class Array
{
    public:
        Array() {};
        ~Array() {};

        int width_, height_;
        std::vector<T> data_;

        template<typename U>
        void print(const Array<U>& inputArray);

        T* operator()(int x, int y);
}

Array.cpp
template<typename T> template<typename U>
void Array<T>::print(const Array<U>& inputArray)
{
    std::cout << ( *inputArray(0, 0) ) << std::endl;
// ERROR: No matching function for call to object of type 'const Array<unsigned char>'
}
template void Array<uint8_t>::print(const Array<uint8_t>& inputArray);
template void Array<uint8_t>::print(const Array<float>& inputArray);

template <typename T>
T* Array<T>::operator()(int x, int y)
{
    return &data_[0] + x + y*width_;
}
template uint8_t* Array<uint8_t>::operator()(int x, int y);
template float* Array<float>::operator()(int x, int y);

It is completely unclear to me why a call to the operator is throwing an error. The operator is clearly defined for both inputs types that are instantiated for function "print".
Is it because the compiler is looking in the header files first and can't find an instance of the operator with the specified type.
Defining the operator in the header file wouldn't do much good either. This (as far as my knowledge reaches) again would raise an error as there are two functions (operators) implemented in the header file with the same name but different return types.
What to do?

A: Your function
void Array<T>::print(const Array<U>& inputArray)

accepts const reference, while method that it is calling:
T* operator()(int x, int y);

is not const hence the error.

A: The first problem is void print(const Array<U>& inputArray); is not const but void Array<T>::print(const Array<U>& inputArray) const is. These are not the same functions. Perhaps you intended to make print static, since it doesn't use this?
The second problem is that the operator T* operator()(int x, int y); is not const but const Array<U>& inputArray is. inputArray can only call const methods.
There are many other problems with your code, but either of these is likely causing your error message.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Hello everyone and welcome back to the blog. This will be our last challenge for the month of December but you will have the entire month to upload your creations for a chance to win the 30.00 gift certificate so keep them coming all month long. We will be choosing two winners during our first challenge next month.
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Have a wonderful week and a Merry Christmas!!!
Happy December everyone, we hope that you had a wonderful time with our challenges last month.
We will only have two challenges in the month of December so that our designer's can enjoy some family time. The two challenges will be open all month so make sure to link up your entries all month for a chance to win. We will announce the 30.00 gift certificate winners on Jan. 6th.
"Let's see where your creativity takes you. Sequins come in every size, shape and color and can be used in so many ways. Where will they end up in your project?"


text:
Carried Away? The Art of the Deal, Brazil-Style
Monica de Bolle (PIIE)
Over the past week, President-elect Donald Trump grabbed headlines with a deal he struck with Carrier to induce the company to keep about half of the 2,000 jobs it had announced were moving to Mexico. In exchange, the company received some $7 million in tax breaks from the federal government. The president-elect's particular style of industrial policy might seem novel to Americans, but it was tried just recently in Latin America's largest economy. Former president Dilma Rousseff, impeached earlier this year, is no Donald Trump—and Brazil is certainly no United States. However, during her first term in office, the government's attempts at salvaging manufacturing jobs looked much like the recent pact with Carrier.
In 2012, Brazil's growth was faltering. Manufacturing as a share of GDP, which had been declining over several years, caught President Rousseff's attention. Although most economists who closely followed the plight of Brazilian manufacturing knew the observed decline reflected both Brazil's isolation from global supply chains and a fatal lack of competitiveness in traditional manufacturing sectors, the government thought it could restore them to their former glory at the stroke of a pen. The pen came to be called the "Plano Brasil Maior", or the "Bigger Brazil Plan." The rhetoric at the time sounded much like "making Brazil great again" by restoring the role of manufacturing and manufacturing jobs.
Rousseff offered no clear strategy. The growth plan consisted of a hodgepodge of policies aimed at particular sectors, involving protectionism (in the form of higher import tariffs and the more widespread adoption of local content requirements) and selective tax breaks for so-called "special sectors." These "special sectors" came to be those that lobbied the government more aggressively for fiscal benefits, promising in return more investments and more jobs. The plan also envisaged the concession of cheap credit provided by public banks to companies that engaged in "boosting productivity" and "focusing on the potential of the local market" for their goods.
The effect of these policies on sectors not contemplated was immediate: Since the government had promised that it would help any sector that favored hiring and investing locally, those that did not receive benefits cut investment and reduced production to pressure the government into giving them the same benefits. Some were successful, some were not. The bottom line is that Rousseff made some headlines, the program was widely touted by the press, but ultimately it failed to create the jobs promised, manufacturing activity continued to decline, and fiscal benefits took a toll on government finances at both the national and subnational levels. Rousseff's failed attempt at "industrial policy" was finally abandoned in 2014, as Brazil's economic and political problems became more evident.
Based on this experience, what can be said of a seemingly similar approach to salvaging manufacturing staged by Trump? Granted, there are many differences between the United States and Brazil, but the lesson is that there are very clear limits to government intervention in the private sector and micromanaging of corporate plans. Perhaps some jobs will be saved, perhaps some companies will make marginal adjustments to their investment plans. Ultimately, however, the drive for competition will prevail, and the results will be lackluster at best. At worst, the government ends up with a much weaker fiscal position and not much to show for it.
Bringing supply chains back to Mexico: Opportunities and obstacles
US Trade Policy and Supply Chain Resilience
Bring back manufacturing? Then invest in America
via San Antonio Express-News


This kid was just hitting his stride after coming back from Tommy John surgery. Cuban defector, and headed for a huge payday.
Puts everything in perspective. Tragic loss. Sad, sad day.
30 ft boat crashed on rocks. Boating accident reported at 3:00 a.m.
Man, turn to ESPN. They are getting the right people on the air.
Cant believe it. He was on top of his game several days ago against the Nats. Didnt know that would be his last performance..
And apparently he was supposed to start today but was bumped up to Monday. Wouldn't have been boating if his start wasn't moved.
These kind of things really puts things into perspective, doesn't it?
ESPN now on to NFL pregame garbage. Don't want to miss that. Idiots.
MLB is where to be know. Dont know if they will get info first or not.