Chap wrote:From much of what has been said on this thread, I carry away the impression that several posters with an academic background want, in effect, to draw a distinction between two possible criticisms of Nibley:
1. He deliberately, consciously, and with the intention of deceiving, misused his sources so as to make them say things contrary to the evident intention of their ancient or medieval authors, by insertion, omission or partial quotation, in such a way as to favor his particular view of the past seen through a Mormon lens. In other words, he lied.
2. He was so immersed in his own idiosyncratically Mormon view of the world that somehow everything that went from the pages he read into his brain and out again through his typewriter became somehow 'Nibleyized', almost (note the 'almost') without his having to perform these acts consciously. This process might be characterized as 'taurocoprography' (to spare Dr. Shades' blushes, I have created this term to avoid an elided version of a word beginning with 'b' and containing a version of the 's' word).
I've tried to write (2) as sympathetically as I can, but as I re-read it, it seems to me simply not plausible that the kinds of distortions documented on this thread could be produced by somebody who was not clearly aware of what he was doing. So I am stuck with (1). He knew what he was doing, and he did it on purpose. He lied.
If this had been Gee, I would have simply said, "He lied," and walked away from it. It is easy to be unsympathetic in regards to an unsympathetic person. Nibley was, in his own way, a much more charming character.
And, I think that what Symmachus has said is right. This falls into your #2 category, but with a different twist. Nibley had a grand vision for how Mormonism was supposed to work. Like many a smart person who wishes the facts lined up with their theories, he lied about the facts in order to make them fit. In different circumstances, he would have been more vigorously taken to task or even censured for so doing. My guess is that some odd combination of him being an institution within his faith and an insignificant person outside of it kept him from being censured.
Chap wrote:His aim seems to be to do no more than to keep his plates spinning and to keep talking for as long and as rapidly as it takes to make the impression he wants to make - which is clearly 'Isn't Professor Nibley brilliant, and gee, it seems we don't have to worry about those horses any more.' It's more male bovine related activity, but this time the word is 'taurocoprology'.
I think your fundamental problem here is in your inability to see how Nibley fooled himself. He was so convinced that his take on things was True that he had no problem lying about the details in order to communicate that Truth. So, your idea about spinning and talking has merit but is an incomplete story.
Chap wrote:If this man had been born in 1980 rather 1910, I don't think he would still be in the Mormon church. He was too clever, and too interested in ferreting things out. The Internet would soon have seen to it that any shelf he might have constructed to keep his testimony would have snapped early on. But he was born when he was, and lived the life he lived. That seems to me to be something quite tragic - though he probably would not have seen it that way.
This contrafactual history is next to meaningless. For starters, there are many smart guys who have the internet and still remain in the LDS Church. It also seems to me that you are oversimplifying the differences between 1980 and 1910. Maybe the dates themselves are not as significant as his relationship with the LDS hierarchy. He was a member of the family. His ancestor was one of Joseph Smith's teachers. This guy was so implicated in Mormonism that it would be difficult to imagine him leaving it. Finally, he was a person with a social conscience who felt the ideal Mormonism was a socially and ecologically conscious one. You might imagine that would be the deal breaker, but you have to remember that he was also close to the corruption and obtuseness of the leadership (including his own grandfather) for his whole life. That didn't break it for him.
What I think may have happened is that FARMS would have died a lot earlier, if it ever got off the ground in the first place. They made money selling his books. Nibley also gave FARMS a library of material that gave their operation the appearance of legitimacy sufficient to attract more donations. With Nibley on the masthead, the fundraisers could go out to ask for money with the message of apologetic success. Other talented people were drawn into the scholarly orbit of FARMS, but each and every one of them was academically crippled by their involvement with it. So many good minds distracted by a fruitless enterprise.