Sashai ben Abishua (Sheshai?) was the 1st

Samaritan High Priest The Samaritan High Priest is the high priest (''kohen gadol'') of the remaining Samaritan community in the Levant. According to Samaritan tradition, the office has existed continuously since the time of Aaron, the brother of Moses, and has been ...

. He was a contemporary and rival of the Jewish High Priest Eli of Shiloah. He lived in the 15th century BC near the time of

Moses Moses hbo, מֹשֶׁה, Mōše; also known as Moshe or Moshe Rabbeinu (Mishnaic Hebrew: מֹשֶׁה רַבֵּינוּ, ); syr, ܡܘܫܐ, Mūše; ar, موسى, Mūsā; grc, Mωϋσῆς, Mōÿsēs () is considered the most important pro ...

The succession of high priests explicitly mentioned in Samarian scripture goes from Moses to Sheshai I, 5th generation from Aaron through teaching of a rite of reciting the name of God, which was more in depth than merely reciting the four letters of the

Tetragrammaton The Tetragrammaton (; ), or Tetragram, is the four-letter Hebrew language, Hebrew theonym (transliterated as YHWH), the name of God in the Hebrew Bible. The four letters, written and read from right to left (in Hebrew), are ''yodh'', ''he (l ...

He may be linked to

Sheshai Sheshai () was a clan of Anakim living in Hebron named for a son of Anak in the Bible (Numbers 13:22). The clans were driven out of the city by Caleb (Joshua 15:14) and the Tribe of Judah (Judges 1:10). The two brothers of Sheshai were Ahiman and ...

son of

Anak Anak (; he, , homophone to a word for "giant, long neck, necklace"; ) is a figure in the Hebrew Bible. His descendants are mentioned in narratives concerning the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites. According to the Book of Numbers, Anak was a ...

. Anak coming from the

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

word

Anax (Greek alphabet, Greek: ; from earlier , ') is an ancient Greek word for "tribal chief, lord, (military) leader".. It is one of the two Greek titles traditionally translated as "king", the other being basileus, and is inherited from Mycenaean Gr ...

meaning king or shaman king As such he may also be linked to the Canaanite king

Sheshi Maaibre Sheshi (also Sheshy) was a ruler of areas of Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period. The dynasty, chronological position, duration and extent of his reign are uncertain and subject to ongoing debate. The difficulty of identification ...

of Egypt. The details of his life and even his existence are unclear, Samaritans credit him as their first high priest, but he rather seems to be the first in their list to deviate from the Israelite list of high priests, being omitted in the Jewish list rather than the line deviating from that point. The Samaritan and Jewish lists only finally deviate in separate directions at

Uzzi Uzzi is a given name. One derivation is biblical, from ''Uzzî'' () meaning "my strength". The name can also be transliterated as Uzi. It may be a nickname for Uzza/Uzzah, Uzzia/Uzziah, and Uziel/Uzziel. Biblical characters with this name: * Uz ...

who is succeeded by Zeheraiah in the Jewish list, and Sashai II in the Samaritan list #

Abraham Abraham, ; ar, , , name=, group= (originally Abram) is the common Hebrew patriarch of the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In Judaism, he is the founding father of the special relationship between the Jew ...

Isaac Isaac; grc, Ἰσαάκ, Isaák; ar, إسحٰق/إسحاق, Isḥāq; am, ይስሐቅ is one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites and an important figure in the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. He was the ...

Jacob Jacob (; ; ar, يَعْقُوب, Yaʿqūb; gr, Ἰακώβ, Iakṓb), later given the name Israel, is regarded as a patriarch of the Israelites and is an important figure in Abrahamic religions, such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. J ...

Levi Levi (; ) was, according to the Book of Genesis, the third of the six sons of Jacob and Leah (Jacob's third son), and the founder of the Israelite Tribe of Levi (the Levites, including the Kohanim) and the great-grandfather of Aaron, Moses and M ...

Kohath According to the Torah, Kehath ( he, קְהָת, ''Qəhāṯ'') or Kohath was one of the sons of Levi and the patriarchal founder of the Kehathites, one of the four main divisions of the Levites in biblical times. In some apocryphal texts, such as ...

Amram In the Book of Exodus, Amram (; ) is the husband of Jochebed and father of Aaron, Moses and Miriam. In the Bible In addition to being married to Jochebed, Amram is also described in the Bible as having been related to Jochebed prior to th ...

Aaron According to Abrahamic religions, Aaron ''′aharon'', ar, هارون, Hārūn, Greek (Septuagint): Ἀαρών; often called Aaron the priest ()., group="note" ( or ; ''’Ahărōn'') was a prophet, a high priest, and the elder brother of ...

Eleazar Eleazar (; ) or Elʽazar was a priest in the Hebrew Bible, the second High Priest, succeeding his father Aaron after he died. He was a nephew of Moses. Biblical narrative Eleazar played a number of roles during the course of the Exodus, from c ...

Phinehas According to the Hebrew Bible, Phinehas or Phineas (; , ''Phinees'', ) was a priest during the Israelites’ Exodus journey. The grandson of Aaron and son of Eleazar, the High Priests (), he distinguished himself as a youth at Shittim with h ...

Abishua Abishua ( ''ʾĂḇīšūaʿ'', "my father is rescue") was an early High priest of Israel. z,, Name and namesakes *The meaning of the name "Abishua" is uncertain, but may be "the (divine) father is opulence."Cheyne and Black (1899), ''Encyclopaedi ...

References

{{Authority control Hebrew Bible people High Priests of Israel Samaritan high priests