Shaul

Shaul is the name borne by three distinct figures in the Hebrew Scriptures: a son of Simeon born to a Canaanite mother, an early king who reigned in Edom before any king reigned over Israel, and a Kohathite Levite descended from Korah. The name is the same Hebrew form sometimes rendered "Saul" in older translations, but UPDV preserves "Shaul" wherever it identifies one of these three men, reserving "Saul" for the first Israelite king and for the apostle. The three figures share nothing but the name and are typically listed as separate persons under a single headword.

Shaul Son of Simeon

The earliest Shaul appears in the household lists that record Jacob's family entering Egypt. Among the sons of Simeon, Shaul is set apart by maternal note: "And the sons of Simeon: Jemuel, and Jamin, and Ohad, and Jachin, and Zohar, and Shaul the son of a Canaanitish woman" (Gen 46:10). The same notice is repeated when Moses rehearses the families of Simeon at the start of the Exodus narrative: "And the sons of Simeon: Jemuel, and Jamin, and Ohad, and Jachin, and Zohar, and Shaul the son of a Canaanitish woman; these are the families of Simeon" (Ex 6:15). Two of his brothers in this list, Simeon and Levi, are remembered for violence (Gen 49:5), but Shaul himself does no recorded act; the text records only his birth and his lineage.

By the wilderness census, Shaul has become the head of a clan, and his name is carried by a family rather than a single man: "of Zerah, the family of the Zerahites; of Shaul, the family of the Shaulites" (Num 26:13). The Shaulites are listed among the Simeonite clans whose totals make up the tribal muster on the plains of Moab. The Chronicler's later genealogy of Simeon retains him in the same position, after Zerah and before the line that fills out the tribe: "The sons of Simeon: Nemuel, and Jamin, Jarib, Zerah, Shaul" (1 Chr 4:24). What begins in Genesis as a single half-Canaanite son of the patriarch becomes, by the end of the Pentateuch, one of the small set of Simeonite ancestral houses.

Shaul of Rehoboth, King of Edom

The second Shaul reigns long before any Israelite monarchy. The king-list in Genesis, which records the kings of Edom "before any king reigned over the sons of Israel," names him in the line of succession: "And Samlah died, and Shaul of Rehoboth by the River reigned in his stead" (Gen 36:37). The Chronicler reproduces the same list and adds the close of his reign: "And Samlah died, and Shaul of Rehoboth by the River reigned in his stead. And Shaul died, and Baal-hanan the son of Achbor reigned in his stead" (1 Chr 1:48-49). His seat is "Rehoboth by the River," distinguishing him from the Edomite kings of other towns in the same list. The Edomite line itself stands on the older patriarchal frame: Edom is the people descended from Esau, "the father of the Edomites in mount Seir" (Gen 36:9), and even later legislation preserves a kinship note on them: "You will not be disgusted by an Edomite; for he is your brother" (Deut 23:7). Shaul of Rehoboth belongs to that early, brother-nation kingship, recorded only as a transitional name between Samlah and Baal-hanan.

Shaul the Kohathite Levite

The third Shaul stands in the genealogy of the Kohathites, the Levitical clan responsible for the holy things of the sanctuary. The line of Levi runs through Kohath: "And the sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari" (Gen 46:11), and the Kohathites' charge in the wilderness was to bear the sanctuary on the march (Num 10:21). Within that line, the Chronicler traces a descent through Korah: "The sons of Kohath: Amminadab his son, Korah his son, Assir his son, Elkanah his son, and Ebiasaph his son, and Assir his son, Tahath his son, Uriel his son, Uzziah his son, and Shaul his son" (1 Chr 6:22-24). This Shaul is a son of Uzziah — not the later king of Judah of the same name, but a Kohathite ancestor in the temple-musician's line that the Chronicler is at pains to preserve. Nothing else is said of him; his place in Scripture is wholly genealogical.

Reading the Three Together

The three Shauls illustrate a pattern common to the genealogical literature of the Old Testament: a single Hebrew name attaches to men of unrelated tribe, era, and covenantal standing — a Simeonite half-Canaanite of the patriarchal age, an Edomite king before Israel had a king, and a Levitical ancestor in the Kohathite line. The frames they stand within are accordingly distinct: the tribal house of Simeon, the brother-nation of the Edomites, and the Levitical clan of Kohath. None of the three appears outside the Old Testament passages cited above. UPDV's rendering of the name as "Shaul" at Gen 36:37, where older versions read "Saul," keeps these three figures distinct in English from the later Benjamite king Saul and from the apostle who bore the same Hebrew name.