Hugh Nibley in 2000.
If you have not been able to tell, one of my top role models and mentors is Dr. Hugh Winder Nibley, former BYU professor and highly esteemed LDS scholar. He was and is still considered the foremost LDS scholar and apologist of this century, and perhaps of all time. And he was a genius. Once at a Biblical Society meeting the Jesuit scholar George MacRae, former dean of the Harvard Divinity School, heard Hugh expound lengthily on a Greek text without notes including sporadically quoting thirty lines of the original, for which MacRae covered his face and confessed – “It is obscene for a man to know that much” ((Truman Madsen in Hugh Nibley, On the Timely and the Timeless, x-xi.)). Hugh Nibley passed away in 2005 at the age of 94.
A a couple decades ago a film documentary was produced about Hugh. Son-in-law Boyd Petersen notes:
During the early stages of FARMS, Jack Welch began to consider producing a documentary about Hugh’s life and work. Jack felt that a good production could be done for the modest sum of about five thousand dollars. The idea took on a life of its own, led to hundreds of hours of personal interviews with Hugh, his family, friends, associates, and consumed a budget of a quarter-million dollars. Welch approached Hugh’s son, Alex, who had studied at the American Conservatory Theater and was working at Sundance on what would later ecome the Sundance Film Institute. Alex liked the idea and talked it over with his supervisor at Sundance, Sterling Van Wagenen. Soon they added a cinematographer named Brian Capener to the team. As they began to plan the film, Alex hoped it would show the more conversational side of his father. “I wanted to show the public part of what I saw in private,” stated Alex.
Although Alex had informed Hugh about the project, Hugh didn’t fully appreciate that the project would actually become a reality until Paul Springer wrote him giving “broad hints and well-justified jibes.” Needless to say, Hugh was furious: “What in hell is going on? Charles (Alex) is being maddeningly uncommunicative. Here I was, sinking into the grateful obscurity of a somewhat benign old age, and this thing breaks loose. I must put a stop to whatever Charles is up to. I did not settle in and for the suffocating obscurity of Provo to attract public notice.” ((Boyd Petersen, Hugh Nibley: A Consecrated Life, 374-375.))
But cooperate he did, and the documentary became a profound success. I think far too many people inside the Church and out have ignored the weighty contributions of the scholarship and faithful example of Hugh Nibley.
You can watch the full documentary “Faith of an Observer” by clicking this link.
Also, Nibley’s newest book Eloquent Witness is said to have a transcript of this video.
Ditto!!
I love the MacRae quote, and I have often thought the same thing for years and years. The rest of us must function on poor memories, poor multi-language skills, and insufficient time to do our meager studies. So, indeed, there is something extraordinary about the one-of-a-kind Nibley.
I am grateful for the video, even if Nibley was uncomfortable with it. He was interested in scholarship NOT fame. But, for the rest of us, it is nice to have a scholar to look up to… way, way up.
Nibley, along with John Welch, seemed to consider Approaching Zion as Nibley’s most important work (or book since they are all collections of many works). His blistering critique of capitalism and greed is one of my favorite pleasures.
I once took a faculty seminar at UVSC with Boyd Petersen. He mentioned that there seems to be those that like Nibley’s temple writings and those that like his social/political/economic writing, but few people fall into both categories. I, for one, put myself in both categories. I am an apoligist for the gospel, but I am not a defender of all things Mormon and American. That is how I view Nibley.
One reason he did not like all of the attention was because he thought Mormons should think and research for themselves rather than contantly quote Nibley.
mentor? This usually implies a direct relationship. Please explain.
I have loved Sterling’s film about Hugh since I first saw it at BYU when it was premiered. I obtained a VHS copy as soon as it was available and have shared it with a lot of friends. Those viewings eventually led to at least one baptism. Hugh was glad for that and he sent a short piece to be read at the service giving his testimony.
I taught at BYU in the art department in the 1980s and would often crash his Pearl of Great Price and Book of Mormon classes. On one occasion the Honors Program who sponsored the class passed out leaflets before class warning all of us interlopers that we were not welcome unless we had registered for the class. When Brother Nibley came in he looked at one of the notices and, snorting in his unique way, asked that all of them be passed to him as he needed some more scrap paper for note taking. He then announced for the benefit of the Honors Program types present that if they persisted with this harrassment he would take the class off campus and then jumped right into his lecture.
I would also count myself as one who likes Hugh’s temple writing and his social/political/economic writings. I am particularly keen on his writings on our relationship to “the environment”. After reading your response to the Pixar film Wall-E I am curious how you feel about Hugh’s writings on the topic. Where is the line between our stewardship over creation and the “religion of environmentalism”? Do you consider Dr Nibley’s social, political and economic writings liberal , moderate or conservative? I have sat in the audience as he delivered keynote addresses at gatherings of both the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance Fall Roundup and The Sunstone Symposium, both organizations considered by most to be liberal on social, political and economic issues.
Thank you for your response Bryce. I look forward to your coming post.
My sad conclusion is that neither major political party has balance in their approach to environmental stewardship. I am reminded of Nibley’s oft used comment about what he called “the devil’s dilemma”. It goes like this; “You have freedom to chose in this world. What will it be, cigarettes or cigars, communism or capitalism, etc?” In every case neither man made system or product really fits God’s plan for us. The left as you have pointed out is extreme and tries to paint humankind out of the picture. The right favors industry at the expense of human and planetary health issues. I am amused at tee shirt slogans of young lefties that say “save the planet”. The planet does not need saving nearly as badly as we do. It is our home that is being polluted beyond usabiliy. It is us who are in danger of suffocating in our own waste. The earth will clean herself up just fine after we have poisoned ourselves out of a home. She is designed to do so and, except for fulfilling the measure of her creation, would be better off without our presence. Of course being the provider of our bodies she would rather endure our bad behavior and help us on our eternal progression than be free of the trouble that we are. She , like us, awaits the return of our creator to help us fix the mess we have made of things both spiritually and physically. I feel justified in personifying the earth based on Moses 7: 48-49. In that respect she is the “mother of men”. This does not constitute earth worship but an acknowledgment of scriptural truth. We worship the true and living God but reverence the earth as his footstool and our physical source.
Long story short; if Al Gore and the environmental extreme are the false prophets of environmental doom then Dick Cheney and his band of secret energy advisors are the counterpart on the right. God help us if either gets their way.