Joe created the religion, and managed to convince people to pay for him even though he never found any treasure. He wrote 500 pages of bullshit and more bullshit prophecies and even more wives.


Hugh Nibley somehow supported the religion, created fake footnotes straight up lied to interviewers, misquoted sources, and was the king of Mormon apologetics.

I believe we have quite the competition.

If you believe his daughter (and there's good reason to), Nibley also sexually molested young girls, like Smith.
Two of a kind. Neither is "better."

I am not a fan of Nibley, but I did know and have spoken to him on several occasions at BYU. In the interest of honesty, Nibley, AS FAR AS WE KNOW never "sexually molested young GIRLS". He was, however, accused of molesting his own daughter by the victim herself.

Martha Beck, the daughter, in her book "Leaving the Saints" states very clearly that Nibley molested her when she was five. Her siblings strongly disagree and Nibley himself never responded. A major problem with recalled memories of this nature is what medical experts termed False Memory Syndrome wherein a person fully believes and will swear something is true when, in fact, it never happened. In Nibley's case, Steve Benson, a frequent OP on this board, knows Martha very well and has posted that she is a truthful person and accepts her word.

As to Nibley being a liar, the only Mormon apologist that even comes close to his level of deceit is Joseph Fielding Smith.

As as example, Nibley states TWICE on separate pages in his so-called rebuttal (i.e. rag piece) to Fawn Brodie's well known NMKMH, that the Mormon Church is the only church that has NEVER HAD TO CHANGE ITS DOCTRINE! Only Burger King sells more whoppers! Brodie considered Nibley's pamphlet so poorly written (which it clearly was), she saw no need to formally respond.

The Mormon church has yet to publish an adequate response to Brodie, and many of her statements they said were lies are now being admitting to in their recent "essays". Brodie was the first to publish an accurate list of Joseph's wives including the dozen who were married to other men and included the very young ones as well. She wrote about the "rock in the hat", the extensive grammatical corrections to the BoM, the dozens of substantial revisions to Joseph's early revelations, the 1912 Egyptologist repudiations of the BoA and Joseph's numerous failures including Zions Camp, the United Order, the gathering to Zion, the Kirtland Safety Society, and the unsuccessful Salem treasure hunt.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/20/2015 10:48AM by Templar.

Templar Wrote:
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There is more evidence than just Martha's "word," and possible "false memories." If you'd read her book, you'd know that.

I made my statement a conditional -- IF you believe his daughter. However, as I also said, there are good reasons to believe his daughter (including evidence beyond her memories), and no good reason to believe Nibley.

I may well be wrong, but I read her book when it first came out and honestly do not recall anything about anyone other than herself being molested.

I still have her book in my library and would appreciate the pages wherein what you state is found.

BTW I am in no way wanting to defend Nibley - one of the biggest liars the church has ever known. I just want our postings on this board to be completely factual unlike the TSCC apologists.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/20/2015 11:49AM by Templar.

ifIcouldhie said not one word about anyone else being molested. He writes carefully. Please read carefully.

Oops, I didn't see the post higher up in thread. Ok, sometimes he doesn't write carefully.

D'oh.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/20/2015 12:06PM by Brother Of Jerry.

Brother Of Jerry Wrote:
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> ifIcouldhie said not one word about anyone else
> being molested. He writes carefully. Please read
> carefully.

Correct.
And since you read the book, Templar, did you miss the parts where several medical doctors told her she had scarring, internally and externally, consistent with sexual abuse? That's the evidence I refer to.

Nibley, by the way, *did* say "something about it." He denied it to Martha and to some of his other children and relatives. There's no good reason to believe his denials, he offers no evidence to back them up.

edit: I didn't say anything about anyone else being molested. My original post said "he molested young girls." Martha was a young girl. Although in her book, she (Martha) alleges he also molested others...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/20/2015 12:08PM by ificouldhietokolob.

I feel I am being misrepresented here. IN NO CASE DID I EVER STATE THAT HE DID NOT MOLEST MARTHA. As a matter of fact, along with Steve Benson, I feel that he did.

As to other molestations (i.e. "girls"), please supply actual source quotations not assumptions or implications.

I would also appreciate having the references to any published statements by Hugh Nibley on this matter.

I did. Quoting his posting: "Nibley also sexually molested young girls". Does not the word "girls" (plural) imply more than one?

ificouldhietokolob Wrote:
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> no good reason to believe Nibley.

About the molestation? As far as I am aware, he never said anything whatever about it.

Templar Wrote:
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> ificouldhietokolob Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > no good reason to believe Nibley.
>
> About the molestation? As far as I am aware, he
> never said anything whatever about it.

"Her father staunchly denies the accusation (as he does throughout the entire book) and is adamant that he did nothing inappropriate to his daughter. “Well, then, nothing left an awful lot of scars,” she says. Beck isn’t speaking of emotional scars. She insists that she has scar tissue that is “not the kind of scar tissue a kid gets playing on the jungle gym.” On page three she says her father places the blame for such scars on the “Evil One.” “Does he actually think I spent my childhood hanging out with Lucifer?” she asks. “Is the Evil One the name he has for an aspect of himself? If he’s suffering from a split personality or psychotic fugue states, is he aware of this intellectually, or only at some dark subconscious level? Is my father a calculated liar, or is he certifiably insane, or could he actually be empirically correct?"

http://www.mrm.org/leaving-the-saints

"The family notes that the bitter controversy made for a sad conclusion to Nibley's life. He died in February, at the age of 94, as his daughter's book went on sale. In his last months, his other children say, he forcefully denied Beck's charges of sexual abuse and of academic misconduct. "

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/07/AR2005050700981.html



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/20/2015 12:50PM by ificouldhietokolob.

Poor old nibler was batshit crazy. Watching video of him is akin to a visit to the funny farm.

Horny Joe was winging it, making it up as he went along, leaving Nibley to attempt to make sense of it. He wasn't good at it at all. His prodigy Denial Peterson is even worse.

Smith had way more charisma and was therefore better able to con people without putting them to sleep.

Neither was very good at lying. I have Nibley to thank for getting me out of Mormonism. I read his footnotes and had a serious WTF moment.

It's been a while but I remember her description of some sort of freaky Egyptian style ritual with her molestation.

Martha also stated that she thinks her father was having a mental breakdown at that time brought on by attempting to defend the Book of Abraham which, I'm sure, Nibley realized was not possible. In the end, he produced a lot of verbiage that went nowhere. The BoA was clearly a fraud and proves beyond all doubt that Joseph was a fake and liar who created a fraudulent religion.

Nibley is a moderately close second.


Nibley found his niche at ChurchCo as the "lovable absent minded professor" who could explain away anything with a cetain level of "Morridor Legitimacy" but who was intertwined enough and sufficiently reliant upon the organization that he was a de facto "insider" to much of the Morg Ruling Class.

He attained his status by not just the traditional ways (family/church connections,education, reputation, etc) but also
from participating in the organization before correlation.
It seems he became the go to guy for a lot of manual content,articles, sunday school materials, etc. It gave him a big audience in small church quickly.

That was it though. Outside of Mormonism, he is unknown.

http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,1723438,1723438#msg-1723438



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/22/2015 10:16AM by steve benson.