i. The earliest dispersion in Babylonia produced a change in the older

Hebrew of Judæa. The language spoken in the days of David and Solomon was gradually exchanged for the Chaldee or “Syrian tongue.” (Comp. 2 K. xviii. 26; Isai. xxxvi. 11; Dan. ii. 4.) And those who returned from the Captivity and settled in Palestine and Syria, used Chaldee Targums or paraphrases for the interpretation of the Old Hebrew Scriptures, and spake kindred Aramæan dialects, and hence were known as the Aramæan Jews.