WHY ARE THE WRITING’S OF PHILO THE JEW SO IMPORTANT?????

“In the quest for historical evidence as it relates to this subject, we have noticed that Philo is not often mentioned by those who support Saturday Sabbaths. The writings of Philo are very important for establishing Jewish practice and belief both before and during the Messiah’s time here on earth. Philo lived from approximately 20 BCE until about 50 CE. Thus, his lifetime spanned not only the years prior to the Messiah’s birth, but also the years following His resurrection (not to mention the years in between).
The evidence reveals that Philo’s beliefs were representative of those of Judaism during that period of time. Philo, who was born and raised in Alexandria, Egypt, was one of more than 100,000 Jews living in that city. When the prefect Flaccus initiated a massacre of the Jews in the year 39 CE, Philo was selected to head the Jewish delegation that went to Rome to plead their case before Gaius Caligula.

Please pause for a moment and reflect on the significance of Philo’s having been chosen from among his peers for such a monumental task. Would Philo have been chosen for such a mission “if” his practice and beliefs “had not” squared with those of normative Judaism? No, he would not have been chosen unless his views matched those of his peers. We know from Philo’s writings that he did {observed} "Lunar Sabbaths." If normative Judaism had practiced "Saturday Sabbaths" while Philo rebelliously observed "Lunar weeks and Sabbaths," would this detail have affected their decision to select him to lead a delegation to Rome?

Absolutely. Sabbath observance is one of the most distinguishing marks of Judaism, or as author Dayan Grunfeld put it, the Sabbath "epitomizes the whole of Judaism." For Philo to have "gone against the grain" of Judaism with regard to Sabbath observance would have signaled a break with Judaism. We can thus discern that if Philo observed the lunar weeks and Sabbath by the phases of the moon each week, so did the rest of his fellow Jews, including our Savior because there were no controversy between our Savior and the Jews concerning the weekly Sabbath .

We believe Philo did a pretty decent job of explaining how, the weeks are connected to the moon, which are covered in his book.

We feel that a major blow to Sat- sabbatarian theology involves that which Philo “left out” of his writings pertaining to any Saturday Sabbaths. Not once did Philo mention another week other than the "lunar" cycle in determining the Sabbath day. In fact, the word "Saturday or Saturn’s day" isn’t mentioned even “once” in Philo’s entire book.

This is significant, as elsewhere in Philo’s writings, he devotes much space to discussing the cycle of the moon and the #7. In fact, the day of the new moon is listed separate from the weeks as one of the major feasts, and he never counted the new moon when counting the 28 days of the 4 weeks or 4 Sabbaths each month/moon. We find it to be very interesting that Philo mentioned the "moon" and it’s phases of waxing and waning in his commentary regarding the Sabbath. In his writings, Philo distinguishes new moon observance as a separate feast from the weekly Sabbath, and that is why he never includes the new moon in counting out the weeks.

Please study Philo carefully and prayerfully because Philo was an “eye witness ” of how things were done by the Jews in our Savior’s day, including when a week begins and ends. We should not ignore the testimony of eye witnesses when searching for the truth on how something was done. Here are a few of the many proofs of how the Jews is our Saviour’s day understood weeks and Sabbaths.

In order to have a lunar Sabbath, you must have a lunar “week”, did Philo link the Sabbath or the “week” with the phases of the moon or not??? The answer is yes in fact the lunar week and lunar Sabbath is the only week or Sabbath mentioned in Philo’s writings. Let us begin in his writings.