What were the impacts of the Israelite exile in Babylon?
Answer:
The exile to Babylon came in the wake of the destruction of the Temple, which was a major trauma for the Jewish people. However, unlike the destruction of the Second Temple, the people hoped for a speedy return to the Holy Land, and to the rebuilding of the Temple. This return came seventy years after the destruction, yet many Jews remained in Babylon, and a strong community developed, which was ready to absorb the Jews after they were exiled once again in the destruction of the Second Temple. Yet, while the Second Temple stood, the stronghold of world Jewish was in the Holy Land, where the Oral Law was greatly developed. After the Destruction of the Second Temple, the main center of Jewry moved to Babylon, and it was there that the great Torah academies were formed, and numerous traditions developed. In particular, the laws of communities, including all forms of social community function, were developed in Babylon, and many of the fixed elements of ritual we know today took form in Babylon, and were recorded in the Babylonian Talmud.
