Simeon (son of Jacob)

Biblical Account

Simeon was the second son born to Jacob and Leah (Genesis 35:23). Leah named him because the LORD had "heard" that she was unloved: "Because the LORD hath heard that I was hated, he hath therefore given me this son also" (Genesis 29:33). The name is understood to echo the Hebrew verb "to hear" (shama).

According to Genesis 34, after their sister Dinah was defiled by Shechem, the brothers deceived the men of Shechem by making circumcision a condition of their agreement. On the third day after the circumcision, Simeon and Levi attacked the city and killed all the males. Jacob rebuked the two sons, saying that they had made him odious among the surrounding peoples (Genesis 34:30).

In the story of Joseph, when the brothers went down to Egypt to buy grain, Joseph had Simeon bound and kept him as a hostage (Genesis 42:24). Simeon was released only after the brothers returned with Benjamin (Genesis 43:23). On his deathbed Jacob cited the violence of Simeon and Levi and declared, "I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel" (Genesis 49:5-7).

Simeon is recorded as having six sons, including Jemuel and Jamin (Genesis 46:10). The lists in Numbers 26:12-13 and 1 Chronicles 4:24 differ somewhat from this record in their names.

The Tribe of Simeon

In the first census, recorded in Numbers 1, the tribe of Simeon numbered 59,300 men able to go to war (Numbers 1:23). By the second census the number had fallen sharply to 22,200 (Numbers 26:14). Simeon is not mentioned in the blessing of Moses in Deuteronomy 33. At the settlement of Canaan, the tribe of Simeon received cities, including Beersheba, within the inheritance of the tribe of Judah (Joshua 19:1-9).

Significance Within Scripture

Many interpreters regard the fact that the tribe of Simeon lived within Judah without a territory of its own as the fulfillment of the "scattering" Jacob had foretold. In the New Testament, Simeon appears only as the name of one of the sealed tribes in Revelation 7:7 and is not mentioned as an individual. The Simeon of Luke 2 and the name "Simeon" used for Peter in Acts 15:14 refer to different people.

Interpretations and Issues

• Evaluation of the Shechem incident: The brothers protested, "Should he deal with our sister as with an harlot?" (Genesis 34:31). For this reason some interpreters hold that the text leaves the moral judgment open. Others, on the basis of Genesis 49, read the act as violence that Scripture condemns. The apocryphal book of Judith (chapter 9) refers to Simeon's action favorably. Protestants do not regard this book as part of the canon, while the Catholic Church accepts it as deuterocanonical.
• Why Joseph chose Simeon: The text gives no reason. One conjecture is that because Reuben, the firstborn, had tried to save Joseph (Genesis 37:22; 42:22), Joseph chose the next eldest brother instead. Some Jewish traditions relate that Simeon took the lead in harming Joseph, but this is not found in the biblical text.
• Cause of the population decline: Zimri, who was killed in the Baal-peor incident of Numbers 25, was a leader of a family within the tribe of Simeon (Numbers 25:14). Some interpreters cite this record to link the population decline to that incident, although the text does not say so directly.

In the Korean Church

In Sunday school, Simeon is usually taught in connection with the episode in the Joseph story in which he is left behind as a hostage when the brothers go to Egypt. In preaching, he is often cited, on the basis of Genesis 34 and 49, as a cautionary example of violence born of anger and a hot temper.