Kenites

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According to the

The word qēni (קֵינִי)[4] was a patronymic derived from qayin (Hebrew: קַיִן).^[5] There are several competing etymologies.

According to the German Orientalist Wilhelm Gesenius, the name is derived from the name Cain,^[5] the same name as Cain, the son of Adam and Eve. However this may simply be the ancient Hebrew transliteration or phonetization of the Kenites' name in their own language.

Other scholars have linked the name to the term "smith". According to

The Kenites are a clan mentioned in the Bible as having settled on the southern border of the

In Jeremiah 35:7-8 the Rechabites are described as tent-dwellers with an absolute prohibition against practicing agriculture; however, other Kenites are described elsewhere as city-dwellers (1 Samuel 30:29, 1 Chronicles 2:55).^{[citation needed]}

In modern sources the Kenites are often depicted as technologically advanced nomadic blacksmiths who spread their culture and religion to Canaan. The suggestion that the Kenites were wandering smiths was first made by B. D. Stade in Beiträge zur Pentateuchkritik: dasKainszeichen in 1894 and has since become widespread.^[8] This view of the Kenites originated in Germany in the mid-1800s, and it is not reflected in any ancient Hebrew, Greek, Latin, or Arabic sources.

In 1988, Meindert Dijkstra argued that an ancient inscription in a metal mine in the Sinai Peninsula contained a reference to "a chief of the Kenites" (rb bn qn).^[9]

This section uses secondary sources that critically analyze them. Please help improve this article. (February 2023) (Learn how and when to remove this message )

Genesis 15:18-21 mentions the Kenites as living in or around Canaan as early as the time of Abraham.

Moses's father-in-law, Jethro, was a Kenite (Judges 1:16) and a resident in the land of

In Exodus 3:1 Jethro is said to have been a "priest in the land of Midian" and a resident of Midian (Numbers 10:29). This has led many scholars to believe that the terms "Kenite" and "Midianite" are intended (at least in parts of the Bible) to be used interchangeably, or that the Kenites formed a part of the Midianite tribal grouping.

The Kenites journeyed with the Israelites to Canaan (Judges 1:16); and their encampment, apart from the latter's, was noticed by Balaam.^[10]

The Kenites were closely allied with Moses, and are not mentioned to have participated in the first invasion of Canaan (Numbers 14:39–45, Deuteronomy 1:41–46) that was conducted against Moses's orders.

During the second invasion of Canaan (Numbers 21:1–4), the Kenites would have seen the area around the town of Arad, the region of Canaan that the next generation of Kenites would later choose as their place to settle after the conquest.

When the Israelites and Kenites were camped at the foot of Mount Peor, King Balak of Moab allied himself with the five Kings of Midian, but seeing that they did not have the strength to defeat the Israelites, the leaders of Moab and Midian gathered together and paid a large fee to Balaam to put a curse on the Israelite camp from the high place (a type of religious shrine) on Mount Peor (Numbers 22:1–21). Balaam was unable to curse Israel, but prophesied about the Kenites, saying that they would endure, but foretold that someday they would be led away captive as slaves to Assur, (Numbers 24:21–22), with the question of how long their future slavery would last being unanswered.

While the camp was still encamped on the west side of Mount Peor, the local Moabites attempted to include the Israelites in their worship of their god Baal of Peor. During the commotion and bloodshed, Moses's grandnephew Phinehas killed a Midianite princess, Cozbi, the daughter of King Zur, one of the five Kings of Midian (Numbers 25:14–18). Following this, Moses sent a strikeforce of 12,000 men (1000 from each Israelite tribe, the Kenites were not included) that succeed in killing the five kings Evi (אֱוִי),^[11] Rekem (רֶקֶם),^[12] Hur (חוּר),^[13] Reba (רֶבַע),^[14] and Zur (צַוָּר)^[15] the father of Cozbi, (Numbers 31:8, Joshua 13:21) and burned each of the Midianite cities and all of their encampments, taking their livestock (Numbers 31:1–12). The Kenites were not included in the invasion of Midian, it is unclear how the Kenites reacted to the fall of the Midianite kings that they had formerly been subject to.

After the death of Moses, Joshua led the Israelite invasion of Canaan; conquering a large portion of central Canaan. Upon Joshua's death, the Israelite tribes of Judah and Simeon took action to conquer southern Canaan, defeating the Canaanites and the Perizzites at the Battle of Bezek (now Ibziq) in Judges 1:5. After Judah's sieges of Jerusalem and Debir, Judges 1:16 says that Jethro's Kenite descendants "went up from the City of Palms, (which appears to be Zoar or Tamar in the upper Arabah^[16]), with the men of Judah to live among the people of the Desert of Judah in the Negev near Arad."^[16]

Following the conquest, the Israelites began to assimilate into the larger Canaanite culture and started converting to the

Later, King Eglon of Moab allied with the Kingdom of Ammon and nation of Amalek, in order to invade the territory of Israel. (Judges 3:12–15) After defeating the Israelites, Moab and Amalek took the City of Palms (believed to be the later city of Zoar or Tamar^[16]), from the Kenites.

At this point, around 180 or 190 years after Joshua's invasion, the Canaanites in northern Canaan under King Jabin ruling from Hazor re-asserted their dominance over Canaan (Judges 4:1–3). The Israelite leader Shamgar appears to have been battling with the Philistines in south Canaan at the time, and was either caught off-guard, or unable to prevent the rising Canaanite military, economic, and political power. (Non-biblical sources depict the King of Hazor affirming loyalty to the Egyptian pharaoh, and joining the cities of Qatna and Mari to create a trade route that linked Egypt to Ekallatum^[19])

During this period,

After two decades of North Canaanite dominance in the region, the prophetess Deborah, who was now leading Israel, commissioned Barak the son of Abinoam as her commander to lead the Israelites against the Canaanites. (Judges 4:4–10) King Jabin's general Sisera learned that Barak was massing troops on Mount Tabor, situated between Sisera's base at Harosheth Haggoyim (believed to now be Ahwat) and the Canaanite capital at Hazor, and set out northward to meet him with 900 chariots. The weather became unfavorable to Sisera's army, the sky became clouded (Judges 5:4–5), and the river that his chariots needed to cross was flooded. While Sisera attempted to ford his chariots through the torrential Kishon River at a river crossing close to the then-Canaanite city of Taanach (Now known as Ti'inik) near Megiddo (Judges 5:19–21), Barak's 10,000 men went down southwestward from Mount Tabor (Judges 4:14) to give battle on the plain and rivers. Sisera left his chariot behind and escaped the battle on foot, while Barak pursued the chariots that were fleeing back to the Canaanite base at Harosheth Haggoyim (Judges 4:15–16)

Heber the Kenite, and Jael offered to shelter him. Accepting her offer, he asked her to stand in the doorway of the tent, and to deny his presence to anyone who was chasing him. However, once he was asleep, Jael hammered a tent peg into Sisera's head, and he died. (Judges 4:17–22, Judges 5:24–30

)

From that point onwards, Israel grew stronger and continued to press Hazor harder, until King Jabin's defeat. (Judges 4:23–24)

In the early Israelite Monarchy

In the time of

Amalekites to the civic elders of the cities of the Kenites.^[10] (1 Samuel 30:26–31

)

In King Rehoboam's fifth year the Negev, including the Negev of the Kenites, was briefly occupied by the Egyptians during Pharaoh Shishak's (Shoshenq I) campaign into southern Palestine mentioned in 1 Kings 14:25–26 and 2 Chronicles 12:2–12. The fortifications of Arad and "Great" Arad are listed on Row VIII of the Bubastite Portal as falling to Shoshenq after Shaaraim and before Yeruham.^[20]

While the Kenite territory in the Negev had earlier been seen as a separate territory from the parts of the Negev held by Judah and the Simeonites, as the Israelites grew in power, the Negev would be mentioned in the later histories as a single region and integral part of the Kingdom of Judah.

In the northern Negev, the city of Arad served as a key administrative and military stronghold for the Kingdom of Judah. It protected the route from the Judaean Mountains to the Arabah and on to Moab and Edom. It underwent numerous renovations and extensions.^[21]

Archeology

Holy of holies of a temple at Arad, with two incense pillars and two stele, one dedicated to Yahweh, and one most likely to Asherah

The Kenites have been proposed as a reason for the appearance of

Qurayya in Saudi Arabia.^[23]

J. Gunneweg analyzed pottery samples with the help of The Hebrew University and the University of Bonn in 1991. The Midianite pottery found in the Negev was linked to a kiln discovered at Qurayya, Saudi Arabia, through Neutron Activation Analysis.[22]

Excavations at the site of Horvat Uza, and in a ostraca from Arad, seem to indicate the presence of Kenite groups in the Negev in monarchic Judah.^[24] Israeli historian Nadav Na'aman argues that the absence of anthropomorphic and other figurines at the site points to the Kenite settlers practicing aniconism.^[25]

The upper and lower areas of Tel Arad were excavated during 18 seasons by Ruth Amiran and Yohanan Aharoni between 1962 and 1984.^[26][27] An additional 8 seasons were done on the Iron Age water system.^[28]

Critical scholarship

Kenite Hypothesis

Main article: Kenite hypothesis

According to the Kenite hypothesis proposed by the German writer Friedrich Wilhelm Ghillany, Yahweh was historically a Midian deity, and the association of Moses's father-in-law with Midian reflects the historical adoption of the Midianite cult by the Hebrews.^[29][30][31] Moses apparently identified Jethro's concept of a god, Yahweh, with the Israelites' god El Shaddai.^[29] The

Semitic scholar Hermann Guthe, Gerrit Wildeboer, H. P. Smith, and George Aaron Barton.^[33] Another theory is that a confederation of regional tribes were connected to monotheistic ritual at Sinai.^[34]

Links to the mythology of Cain

Some biblical scholars postulated that the Kenites were descendants of the mythical

Wilhelm Gesenius asserted that the name is derived from the name Cain (קַיִן Qayin).^[5]

The German orientalist Walter Beltz alternatively proposed that the story of Cain and Abel was not originally about the murder of a brother, but a myth about the murder of a god's child. In his reading of Genesis 4:1, Eve conceived Cain by Adam, and her second son Abel by another man, this being Yahweh.^[35] Eve is thus compared to the Sacred Queen of antiquity, the Mother goddess. Consequently, Yahweh pays heed to Abel's offerings, but not to Cain's. After Cain kills Abel, Yahweh condemns Cain, the murderer of his son, to the cruelest punishment imaginable among humans: banishment.

Beltz believed this to be the foundational myth of the Kenites, a clan settled on the southern border of Judah that eventually resettled among the tribes of Judah. It seemed clear to him that the purpose of this myth was to explain the difference between the nomadic and sedentary populations of Judah, with those living from their livestock (pastoralists, not raising crops) under the special protection of Yahweh.^[36]

Ronald Hendel believes the Israelites linked the Kenites to Cain to give them a "shameful, violent ancestral origin".^[37]

Kenites as metalworkers

According to the

Aravah region.^[38]

In the 1899

blacksmithing and other evidence, various scholars have associated the Kenites with coppersmithery and metalwork.^[39][40][41]

See also

• The Kinaidokolpitai, identified as being the Kenites in the 100s and 200s AD.
• The Midianites, Possible super-group to the Kenites
• The Kenizzites, an ally of the Kenites in southern Canaan.
• The Calebites, a clan with mixed Judah and Kenizzite heritage, on friendly terms with the Kenites.
• The Ghassanids, the tribe to the south of the Kenites and the later Kinaidokolpitaites.
• Judah, a large Israelite tribe allied with the Kenites in southern Canaan, later the Kingdom of Judah.
• The Simeonites, an Israelite tribe allied with Judah, the Kenites lived in tents to their south and to their east.

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} Butin, Romain. "Cinites." The Catholic Encyclopedia Vol. 3. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908. 27 December 2018 This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
2. ISSN 0792-3910
   .
3. ISSN 1010-9919
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4. ^ Strong's Concordance #7017
5. ^ ^{a b c} Strong's Concordance #7014 Archived 2014-02-22 at the Wayback Machine
6. ^ ^{a b} in Sayce, A. H. (1899). "Kenites". In James Hastings (ed.). A Dictionary of the Bible. Vol. II. p. 834.
7. ^ H. Cuvigny and C. J. Robin, "Des Kinaidokolpites dans un ostracon grec du désert oriental (Égypte)", Topoi. Orient-Occident 6–2 (1996): 697–720, at 706–707.
8. ^ Kalimi, Isaac. "Three Assumptions About the Kenites", vol. 100, no. 3, 1988, pp. 386-393. https://doi.org/10.1515/zatw.1988.100.3.386, bottom of page 1.
9. OCLC 463560331
   .
10. ^ ^{a b}  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Hirsch, Emil G.; Pick, Bernhard; Barton, George A. (1901–1906). "Kenites". In Singer, Isidore; et al. (eds.). The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.
11. ^ "Blue Letter Bible - H189 'ĕvî - Strong's Hebrew Lexicon". /www.blueletterbible.org.
12. ^ "Blue Letter Bible - H7552 reqem - Strong's Hebrew Lexicon". /www.blueletterbible.org.
13. ^ "Blue Letter Bible - H2354 ḥûr - Strong's Hebrew Lexicon". /www.blueletterbible.org.
14. ^ "Blue Letter Bible - H7254 reḇaʿ - Strong's Hebrew Lexicon". /www.blueletterbible.org.
15. ^ "Blue Letter Bible - H6698 ṣaûār - Strong's Hebrew Lexicon". /www.blueletterbible.org.
16. ^ ^{a b c} Yohanan Aharoni Kenite. In Encyclopaedia Judaica, 2nd Edition. Editor, S.D. Sperling. Gale Group, 2008
17. ^ Moran, p.xxxiv
18. ^ Shlomo Izre'el. "The Amarna Tablets". Tel Aviv University. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
19. ^ Horowitz, Wayne, and Nathan Wasserman. “An Old Babylonian Letter from Hazor with Mention of Mari and Ekallātum.” Israel Exploration Journal, vol. 50, no. 3/4, 2000, pp. 169–74
20. ^ Kevin A. Wilson (2001). The Campaign of Pharaoh Shoshenq I Into Palestine. UMI.
21. OCLC 368020822
    .
22. ^ ^{a b} bible.ca - Midianite Pottery https://www.bible.ca/archeology/bible-archeology-midianite-pottery.htm
23. ^ B. Rothenberg & J. Glass, 'The Midianite Pottery', in J.F.A. Sawyer & D.J.A. Clines (eds.) Midian, Moab and Edom: The History and Archaeology of Late Bronze and Iron Age Jordan and North-West Arabia, JSOT Supl. 24, Sheffield: JSOT Press., 1983, 65-124; P.J. Parr, 'Pottery of the Late Second Millennium B.C. from North West Arabia and its Historical Implications', in D.T. Potts (ed.) Araby the Blest. Studies in Arabian Archaeology, The Carsten Niebhur Institute of Ancient Near Eastern Studies Pub. 7, Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 1988, 73-89; ibid. 'Qurayya', in Anchor Bible Dictionary, vol. 5, 1992, 594-596; J.M. Tebes, 'Pottery Makers and Premodern Exchange in the Fringes of Egypt: An Approximation to the Distribution of Iron Age Midianite Pottery', Buried History 43 (2007), 11-26.
24. ISSN 0334-4355
    .
25. ISBN 978-1-57506-456-7
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26. ^ Yohanan Aharoni and Ruth Amiran, "Excavations at Tel Arad: Preliminary Report on the First Season, 1962", Israel Exploration Journal, vol. 14, no. 3, pp. 131-147, 1964
27. ^ Aharoni, Y. "Excavations at Tel Arad: Preliminary Report on the Second Season, 1963." Israel Exploration Journal, vol. 17, no. 4, 1967, pp. 233–49
28. Hadashot Arkheologiyot
    : Excavations and Surveys in Israel, vol. 127, 2015
29. ^
    Harris, Stephen L.
    , Understanding the Bible. Palo Alto: Mayfield. 1985.
30. ^ "Some scholars, on the strength of Ex., xviii, go even so far as to assert that it was from Jethro that the Israelites received a great portion of their monotheistic theology." Catholic Encyclopedia
31. doi:10.1177/0309089208099253
32. ^ Joseph Blenkinsopp, op. cit., pp. 132-133.
33. ^ George Aaron Barton (1859–1942), US Bible scholar and professor of Semitic languages. online Archived 2012-04-26 at the Wayback Machine
34. ^ Mondriaan, Marlene Elizabeth. "The rise of Yahwism: role of marginalised groups". Diss. University of Pretoria. 2010. p. 413. Retrieved 03 April 2024. Archive.org website.
35. ^ Beltz 1990, p. 65.
36. OCLC 75166232.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link
    )
37. ISBN 978-0-19-978462-2
    .
38. ISBN 978-3-11-031332-1
    .
39. ^ "YHWH: The Original Arabic Meaning of the Name - TheTorah.com". www.thetorah.com.
40. ^ YHWH: Origin of a desert God, Robert Miller II
41. ^ "Metallurgy, the Forgotten Dimension of Ancient Yahwism | Bible Interp".

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Singer, Isidore; et al., eds. (1901–1906). "Kenites". The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.

Further reading

• Hirsch, Emil G., Bernhard Pick and George A. Barton. "Kenites."
  Jewish Encyclopedia
  . Funk and Wagnalls, 1901–1906; which cites to the following bibliography:

• Stade, Geschichte des Volkes Israel, i. 126 et seq., Berlin, 1889;
• Moore, "Judges", in International Critical Commentary, pp. 51–55, New York, 1895;
• Budde, Religion of Israel to the Exile, pp. 17–38, New York;
• Barton, Semitic Origins, pp. 271–278, ib. 1902.

External links

• "Kenite". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 2009.