{"id":72685,"date":"2020-03-31T19:27:37","date_gmt":"2020-03-31T16:27:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=72685"},"modified":"2020-03-31T19:27:37","modified_gmt":"2020-03-31T16:27:37","slug":"the-ancient-kingdom-of-elam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-ancient-kingdom-of-elam\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ancient Kingdom of Elam"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[],"acf":{"old_id":"72685","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":33877,"related_cahpter":"449","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Shades of Ahasuerus\u00a0\r\n\r\n","content":"

Our Chapter continues Jeremiah\u2019s “oracles against foreign nations” (Chapters 46 to 51). Here Jeremiah prophesies in dramatic verse against Ammon, Edom, Damascus, Kedar, Hazor, and Elam. Our chapter concludes with Jeremiah\u2019s oracle against Elam: \u201cAnd I will set My throne in Elam and wipe out from there king and officials, says the Lord. But in the days to come I will restore the fortunes of Elam\u2014declares the Lord\u201d (Jeremiah 49:38-39).<\/span><\/p>\n

From other references in Scripture, it seems that Elam was an empire just east of Babylonia that was defeated by the Assyrians in the mid-7<\/span>th<\/span> century BCE, who in turn were defeated in 612 BCE by the Babylonians and Medes (see Ezekiel 32:22-25). Elsewhere in Scripture Elam is associated with \u201cShushan Ha-Birah (the fortress capital) (see Daniel 8:2 and compare Esther 1:2). Similarly, Ezra (4:9) indicates that Susa is the place of the Elamites.<\/span><\/p>\n

Current research locates the ancient empire of Elam on the edge of the southwestern part of the Iranian plateau, modern Khuzistan, including the river valley around Susa and the highlands beyond. Indeed, in Mesopotamian languages, the name Elam was understood as \u201cThe Heights\u201d \u2013 related to Akkadian \u201cElu\u201d, i.e. High. In Greek sources, Elam is referred to as \u201cSusiana\u201d, further indicating that the capital of this ancient empire was Susa\/Shushan. The Elamite language is not related to any other known language group. Late cuneiform Elamite was deciphered only in the 19<\/span>th<\/span> century from bilingual and trilingual Persian inscriptions. The earliest known Elamite ideographic texts still remain unintelligible.<\/span><\/p>\n

Politically, Elam was clearly one of the major empires of the ancient Near East. The history of Elam is conventionally divided into four periods of ascendancy and decline, extending from 3200 BCE to 540 BCE. In 539 BCE, this ancient empire was effectively absorbed into the First Persian Empire by Cyrus the Great. Significantly, Cyrus adopted the Elamite title \u201cKing of Anshan\u201d, suggesting that Cyrus himself may have been of Elamite origin. In the administrative division of the Persian Empire, Elam became a satrapy. Susa was rebuilt with magnificent palaces and became a capital city of the Persian monarchs.<\/span><\/p>\n

The grandeur and dominion of Persian Susa is reflected in the Scroll of Esther, which begins: \u201cIt happened in the days of Ahasuerus\u2014that Ahasuerus who reigned over a hundred and twenty-seven provinces from India to Nubia. In those days, when King Ahasuerus occupied the royal throne in the fortress Shushan\u201d (Esther 1:1-2). It thus seems that, perhaps ironically, in the Persian period, the prophecy of Jeremiah was fulfilled: \u201c\u2026in the days to come I will restore the fortunes of Elam\u2014declares the Lord\u201d (Jeremiah 49:39).<\/span><\/p>\n

Talmud Bavli Sanhedrin 24a preserves a tradition that \u201cten measures of arrogance descended to the world. Elam took nine and the remaining one the whole rest of the world\u201d. This leads to their conclusion that because of their lack of humility, the Jewish scholars living in Elam merited to learn but not to teach Torah in contrast to the less haughty Babylonian Talmudic sages.<\/span><\/p>\n

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