KUGLER, FRANZ XAVER. - Jesuit, astronomer, and Assyriologist, b. 27 Nov. 1862 at Königsbach (Palatinate), d. 25 Jan. 1925 at Lucerne. Ordained priest in 1893, he was a disciple of the astronomers J. Epping and J. N. Strassmaier; from 1897 he taught mathematics at the College of Valkenburg. He refuted the assertions of F. Delitzsch, H. A. Winckler, and A. Jeremias concerning the influence of Assyrian astronomical culture on Holy Scripture, indicating a middle course.
Works: Babylon und Christentum: die Angriffe Delitzschs auf das Alt. Test. (Freiburg im Br. 1903); Die Götter Babylon u. das Neue Test. (ibid. 1905); Sternkunde u. Sterndienst in Babel (3 vols., Münster in V. 1907-24); Im Baukreis Babels: Panbabilonistische Konstruktionen und religionsgeschichtliche Tatsachen (ibid. 1910); Von Moses bis Paulus: Forschungen zur Geschichte Israels (ibid. 1922). Not all approve his tendency to determine biblical events exactly according to our chronology.