Genesis 25:14 names him as a son of Yishma-El, and of course it is the same name, with the deity-suffix left out - and really, according to my phonetic rules, both should be written with an apostrophe (Mishm'a, Yishm'a-El), to capture the guttural pause of that closing Ayin.
1 Chronicles 4:25 has Mishma as a son of Shim'on (שמעון) and father of Shim'i (שמעא), all of whom share the common root Shema (שמע) = "to hear", as do several other Biblical characters. This needs more investigating, to see what precisely was the role that the person bearing this title played.
1 Kings 15:22, Jeremiah 50:29 and 51:27, and other references, use Sham'a in the Hiphil (causative) form to mean "to call" or "to summon" or "to issue a proclamation", and perhaps this is the key: the shofar blower who did for the ancients what the bell-ringer did for the mediaevals and the muezzin still does for the Moslems. Remembering that Shim'on is "twinned" with Levi (Genesis 49:1-7), there is a logic to this; and as the most nomadically Bedou of all the tribes, there is a still further logic.
The Mishma tribe of Chronicles inhabited the tribal region of Shim'on, which included Be'er Sheva and Betu-El - see 1 Chronicles 4:20-33, where they are also specifically identified with Ba'al worship!
The Mishma tribe of Chronicles inhabited the tribal region of Shim'on, which included Be'er Sheva and Betu-El - see 1 Chronicles 4:20-33, where they are also specifically identified with Ba'al worship!
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