In this section of the book we turn to the writings of Philo, not, however, for his own sake, but rather for the purpose of gleaning evidence about his colleagues and predecessors. We will thus be able to fill in a conspicuous gap in our picture of Alexandrian Judaism, which is created by the lack of independent exegetical sources between the mid second century bce and Philo. David Hay has already stressed that Philo did not write in an intellectual vacuum but conceived of ‘exegesis as a kind of dialogical enterprise that involves debate partners and opponents’, and we now face the challenge of reconstructing his intellectual environment.

Following the direction of Hay's own work, we shall focus on Philo's references to other interpreters. For the purposes of this book all of Philo's references have been carefully studied. The great variety of their style and content is so conspicuous that they must reflect different exegetical orientations of independent Jewish exegetes. They certainly cannot be reduced to rhetorical figures, which do not point to real people or discussions, as has sometimes been suggested. Philo's references thus provide an invaluable glimpse into the original variety of Alexandrian Judaism, which does not happen to have been fully preserved by the Church Fathers. The identity and precise historical circumstances of these exegetes can no longer be known, but Philo speaks of them as if they were contemporaries.