**Section 2: The Aramaic Period (c. 722 BCE — 340 BCE)**The conquest of Palestine by the Aramaic-speaking Neo-Assyrian Empire marks the beginning of a protracted language shift among Jews in the country from the use of Hebrew to Aramaic as their vernacular. This conquest took place over several decades and began in 722 BCE, solidifying Aramaic-speaking imperial control of Palestine until Alexander’s conquest in 340 BCE. This conquest was extremely violent and featured the deportation of thousands of Palestinian Jews, weakening the Hebrew-speaking community and allowing Aramaic to more easily permeate society. Although the Assyrian conquest of Palestine was extremely violent, the general lack of persecution of Jews under Assyrian rule allowed Jews to adopt Aramaic as a vernacular, eventually leading it to supplant Hebrew entirely. During Aramaic-speaking rule of Palestine, Aramaic became the High language and Hebrew the Low language among Palestinian Jews, pressuring Jews to adopt Aramaic in order to access socioeconomic benefits.
The Talmud is a central part of Judaism and is written in Hebrew and Aramaic. The Talmud is a record of rabbinic discussions about the Torah that took place in Jerusalem and Babylon between the 2nd and 5th centuries CE, with the final record being complete by the 5th century. The Talmud is divided into two versions: the Babylonian Talmud, which is compiled around 500 CE, and the Jerusalem Talmud, which is compiled around 400 CE, but is much shorter.