ATLANTA — In a scene reminiscent of a Shakespearean tragedy, Bernice King stood in her father’s pulpit Thursday to both disavow her brothers’ values and claim her love for them.

Flanked by supporters who included lions of the civil rights movement, the youngest child of Coretta and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. declared: “I love them dearly. I love Martin and Dexter, but we are different people, with different minds and different ideologies and, most importantly, a different relationship with God.”

At issue is the brothers’ wish to sell two items Bernice King called “sacred” — their father’s Bible and the Nobel Peace Prize he was awarded in 1964. Last week, Martin Luther King III and Dexter Scott King sued their sister in Fulton County Superior Court, demanding that she relinquish possession of the items.

It is not the first time the siblings have been at odds, or that their differences have spilled over into the courts. But this time, the feelings are raw and the words cut right to the bone.

“I take this strong position for my father, because Daddy is not here to say for himself, ‘My Bible and my medals are not to be sold,’” Bernice King said at the news conference inside historic Ebenezer Baptist Church.

“I stand here in his stead, as his biological and spiritual heir, to say they should not be sold because they are sacred. And I want it noted that there was at least one heir who tried to further the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr.”