Eventually, the main rabbinic center in Palestine moved to Tiberias. Other important academies were located at Sepphoris, Caesarea, and Lydda. But the deteriorating economic situation, constant political instability, and finally the pressure and persecution from apostate Christianity led to large-scale immigration to another major Jewish population center to the East—Babylonia.

Toward the end of the fourth and in the beginning of the fifth centuries C.E., the situation became particularly difficult for the Jews in Palestine. Waves of restrictions and persecution under the rising authority of apostate Christendom led to the final blow of abolishing both the Sanhedrin and the position of Nasi (patriarch) by about 425 C.E. So the Palestinian Amoraim began consolidating in a single coherent work the summaries of the debates in the academies to ensure their preservation. This work, compiled in haste in the latter part of the fourth century C.E., became known as the Palestinian Talmud.b

The Two Talmuds—How Do They Compare?

The Hebrew word “Talmud” means “study” or “learning.” The Amoraim of Palestine and Babylonia had set out to study, or analyze, the Mishnah. Both Talmuds (Palestinian and Babylonian) do this, but how do they compare? Jacob Neusner writes: “The first Talmud analyzes evidence, the second investigates premises; the first remains wholly within the limits of its case, the second vastly transcends them.”

The more intensive and thorough editing given to the Babylonian Talmud made it not only much larger but also deeper and more penetrating in its mode of thought and analysis. When the word “Talmud” is mentioned, it is usually the Babylonian Talmud that is meant. This is the Talmud that has been most studied and commented on throughout the centuries. In the opinion of Neusner, the Palestinian Talmud “is a work of competence,” and the Babylonian Talmud “is a work of genius.”