To all, don't listen to the above point as it is just to derail the thread again.
Sir Isaac Newton:
That the Israelites used the Luni-solar year is beyond question. Their months began with their new Moons. Their first month was called Abib, from the earing of Corn in that month. Their Passover was kept upon the fourteenth day of the first month, the Moon being then in the full: and if the Corn was not then ripe enough for offering the first Fruits, the Festival was put off, by adding an intercalary month to the end of the year; and the harvest was got in before the Pentecost, and the other Fruits gathered before the Feast of the seventh month....
If the month started by the equinox, and there was no Aviv, then the mandates of the Passover ceremony could not be done. God would (rightfully) strike them dead if they did not keep His feasts right in ancient Israel.
King David and the Bible:
Blow the trumpet at the time of the New Moon,
At the full moon, on our solemn feast day.
He appointed the moon for seasons (H4150);
The sun knows its going down.
H4150
מועדה מעד מועד
mô‛êd mô‛êd mô‛âdâh
mo-ade', mo-ade', mo-aw-daw'
From H3259; properly an appointment, that is, a fixed time or season; specifically a festival; conventionally a year; by implication, an assembly (as convened for a definite purpose); technically the congregation; by extension, the place of meeting; also a signal (as appointed beforehand): - appointed (sign, time), (place of, solemn) assembly, congregation, (set, solemn) feast, (appointed, due) season, solemn (-ity), synagogue, (set) time (appointed).
Thou shalt keepH8104 (H853) the feastH2282 of unleavened bread:H4682 (thou shalt eatH398 unleavened breadH4682 sevenH7651 days,H3117 asH834 I commandedH6680 thee, in the time appointedH4150 of the monthH2320 Abib;H24 forH3588 in it thou camest outH3318 from Egypt:H4480 H4714 and noneH3808 shall appearH7200 beforeH6440 me empty: )H7387
From Wikipedia:
Importance of lunar months
From very early times, the Mesopotamian lunisolar calendar was in wide use by the countries of the western Asia region. The structure, which was also used by the Israelites, was based on lunar months with the intercalation of an additional month to bring the cycle closer to the solar cycle.[10]
Num 10:10 stresses the importance in Israelite religious observance of the new month (Hebrew: ראש חודש, Rosh Chodesh, "beginning of the month"): "... in your new moons, ye shall blow with the trumpets over your burnt-offerings..." Similarly in Num 28:11. "The beginning of the month" meant the appearance of a new moon. In prophet Amos, the new moon seem to be described simply as Kadosh.
More recently E. W. Bullinger:
From "The Witness of the Stars"
Genesis 1:14 is therefore, "They (the sun, moon and stars) shall be for signs (things to come) and for cycles (appointed times)."
Bullinger does a good job of mathematically relating the prophetic calendar of 360 days to lunar cycles (months), i.e. the relation to 1260, 2520, 666, etc. and how the lunar cycles related to the solar cycles.
There's enough evidence that no serious scholar (or Jew) denies that the months were lunar. "That the ancient Israelites used a lunar calendar is a no-brainer" is what Newton should have said, for if we deny this smack-one-in-the face with vast tons of evidence before us, than anyone who denies this fact is totally out of touch with reality. I won't even entertain the opposite of what is blatantly obvious.
Now, does anyone else want to talk about prophecy?
