Language. In discussing Elam, reference works generally claim that the writer of Genesis listed Elam under Shem only on a political or a geographic basis since, they say, the people of Elam were not Semitic. This view they base on the claim that the language of the Elamites was not Semitic. Investigation, however, reveals that the earliest inscriptions found in the geographic region designated Elam are “mere lists of objects pictorially jotted down on clay-tablets with the numbers of each beside them, indicated by a simple system of strokes, circles and semicircles . . . their contents at this time are purely economic or administrative.” (Semitic Writing, by G. R. Driver, London, 1976, pp. 2, 3) These inscriptions could reasonably be called “Elamite” only as meaning that they were found in the territory of Elam.

The weight of the argument of those opposing the inclusion of Elam among the Semitic peoples, therefore, rests principally upon later inscriptions in cuneiform, regarded as dating considerably within the second millennium B.C.E., as well as on the Behistun monument (of the sixth century B.C.E.), which contains parallel texts in Old Persian, Akkadian, and “Elamite.” The cuneiform inscriptions attributed to the Elamites are said to be in an agglutinative language (one in which root words are joined together to form compounds, thereby distinguished from inflectional languages). Philologists have not been able successfully to relate this “Elamite” language to any other known tongue.

In evaluating the above information, it should be remembered that the geographic region in which the descendants of Elam eventually concentrated may well have been occupied by other peoples prior to or even during such Elamite residence there, just as the early non-Semitic Sumerians resided in Babylonia. The Encyclopædia Britannica (1959, Vol. 8, p. 118) states: “The whole country [designated Elam] was occupied by a variety of tribes, speaking agglutinative dialects for the most part, though the western districts were occupied by Semites.”​—Italics ours; MAP and CHART, Vol. 1, p. 329.

That the cuneiform inscriptions found in the region of Elam would not of themselves prove that the true Elamites were originally non-Semitic can be seen from the many ancient historical examples that can be cited of peoples adopting a tongue other than their own because of domination or infiltration by foreign elements. There are likewise examples of ancient peoples simultaneously employing another language along with their own for commercial and international uses, even as Aramaic became a lingua franca used by many peoples. The “Hittites” of Karatepe wrote bilingual inscriptions (evidently in the eighth century B.C.E.) in “Hittite” hieroglyphic script and in old Phoenician. Some 30,000 clay tablets of the time of Persian King Darius I were found at Persepolis, a royal Persian city. They were mainly in the language termed “Elamite.” Yet Persepolis would not be called an Elamite city.

Further showing that it is unwise to view the table of nations at Genesis chapter 10 as purely geographic, and not actually genealogical, is the evidence in the form of sculptures carved for Elamite kings and dated by archaeologists as far back as the time of Sargon I (whose rule they assign to the latter part of the third millennium). These sculptures not only present the form of typical Akkadian (Semitic Assyro-Babylonian) figures but also bear Akkadian inscriptions.​—The Illustrated Bible Dictionary, edited by J. D. Douglas, 1980, Vol. 1, p. 433.

An Elamite official named Kudur-Mabuk who successfully occupied the prominent city of Larsa (along the Euphrates north of Ur) appointed his son Warad-Sin as king there. Noteworthy is the fact that Warad-Sin and Rim-Sin (Warad-Sin’s brother who succeeded him as king) are both Semitic names, further substantiating a Semitic element in Elam.