SALT LAKE CITY Prominent Mormon historian Hugh Nibley died today. He was 94. Cause of death wasn't immediately announced.

Nibley wrote more than 150 items, many of which are available in collected work at Brigham Young University and published by FARMS, the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies.

B-Y-U professor Daniel Peterson said his work was marked by "brilliance, unbelievable erudition."

SALT LAKE CITY (February 22, 2005) - In response to the allegations in our sister Martha Beck's book "Leaving the Saints," we - all seven of Martha's siblings - release the following statement:

Knowing our sister and the circumstances of our home, we agree that Martha Beck's portrayal of our family in "Leaving the Saints" is false. We are saddened by the book's countless errors, falsehoods, contradictions, and gross distortions. She misrepresents our family history, the basic facts of our lives, our family culture, the works of our father Hugh Nibley, and the basic principles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She also omits critical facts including her own previous writings, her and her husband's search for their sexual identities, and the tortuous process -- including self-hypnosis -- by which she achieved her "recovered memories."

The man many consider to be the pre-eminent in-house scriptural scholar for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints died Thursday after a long life spent researching and defending the faith's canon.

Hugh Nibley, 94, was an expert in ancient scripture and language and was revered by Mormons.

Hugh Winder Nibley died Feb. 24, 2005, at his home in Provo of causes incident to age. He was 94.

Students of scripture unique to the LDS Church - including the Book of Mormon and the faith's Book of Abraham - have been influenced by Nibley even if they don't know him by name, according to fellow scholars at Brigham Young University, where he taught for several decades.

His extensive writings - including several full-length books, scholarly papers and doctrinal treatises incorporating the use of ancient languages in interpreting scripture - are to be published by the Foundation for Ancient Research in Mormon Studies (FARMS) at BYU and number 15 volumes.

"Hugh Nibley convinced the membership of the church and the world that the restoration (of the LDS Church) and the scriptures given to (church founder) Joseph Smith could be comfortably defended using the best scholarship of our times," said Noel Reynolds, director of FARMS.

Family members and friends remembered Hugh Winder Nibley Wednesday not only as a world-class scholar of the scriptures and defender of the LDS faith, but as a loving father, a humble humanitarian and a staunch environmentalist.

Hundreds gathered in the Provo Tabernacle and scores of additional admirers were in the DeJong Concert Hall at Brigham Young University to pay their final respects to the man many consider the most brilliant scriptural scholar ever to come out of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

SALT LAKE CITY - The siblings of an author who penned a tell-all book about alleged sexual abuse in their prominent, religious home are denying the claims about their late father, but Martha Nibley Beck adamantly stands by her recovered memories of the alleged abuse by Mormon scholar Hugh Nibley.

Beck's brother, Alex Nibley, and sister, Christina Mincek, told The Associated Press neither they nor their five other siblings or mother have found credible evidence that the molestation occurred.

"We know the character of our father, we've talked to him about this in great detail, we've talked to Martha about this in great detail," Alex Nibley said. "After all these years, there are eight of us who stand firm that the molestation never happened."

The family last month issued a statement denouncing the book "Leaving the Saints: How I Lost the Mormons and Found My Faith," but said as their more famous sister - she's a columnist for O: The Oprah Magazine and wrote the best-selling book "Expecting Adam" - made the rounds of national television shows to promote her book, they felt their side wasn't being accurately portrayed.

"Why are we so often decoyed? Nibley replies, "We know what Zion is, we know what Babylon is, we know that the two can never mix, and we know that Latter-day Saints, against the admonition of their leaders, have always tried to mix them. How is that done? By the use of rhetoric--"The art of making true things seem false and false things seem true by the use of words." The trick is to appear rich as the result of being good--to cultivate the virtue of respectability. The "worst sinners, according to Jesus, are|.|.|.|the religious leaders with their insistence on proper dress and grooming, their careful observance of all the rules, their precious concern for status symbols, their strict legality, their pious patriotism."