Kenites

Biblical References

• Genesis 15:19: When God made a covenant with Abraham, "the Kenites" head the list of peoples inhabiting the land He promised to give him.
• Numbers 24:21-22: Balaam looks upon the Kenites and prophesies that, although their dwelling place is as strong as a rock, they will eventually be wasted and carried away captive by Assyria.
• Judges 1:16: Moses' father-in-law is identified as a Kenite. His descendants went up with the children of Judah from the city of palm trees (Jericho) and settled in the wilderness of Judah, south of Arad.
• Judges 4-5: Heber the Kenite separated himself from the children of Hobab and pitched his tent near Kedesh. In the time of Deborah, Sisera, the captain of the Canaanite army, fled to the tent of Heber's wife Jael, and Jael killed him. The Song of Deborah praises her: "Blessed above women shall Jael the wife of Heber the Kenite be" (Judges 5:24).
• 1 Samuel 15:6: Before attacking Amalek, Saul warned the Kenites to depart, because they had shown kindness to Israel when Israel came up out of Egypt.
• 1 Samuel 27:10; 30:29: "The south of the Kenites" and "the cities of the Kenites" are mentioned. David sent portions of the spoil to these cities.
• 1 Chronicles 2:55: The families of scribes in the region of Judah are described as "the Kenites that came of Hemath, the father of the house of Rechab."

Background

The Hebrew name is Qeni. It is thought to share the same root as the name Cain (Qayin). Some connect this root with a Semitic word meaning "smith" and regard the Kenites as a group of itinerant metalworkers, but this is a scholarly theory rather than an established fact. According to the biblical text, the Kenites lived mainly in tents in the wilderness south of Judah, though some were scattered elsewhere, such as in the north near Galilee (Heber) or among the Amalekites. Moses' father-in-law Jethro is introduced in Exodus as a priest of Midian, yet in Judges he is called a Kenite. For this reason, many regard the Kenites as a branch of the Midianites.

Significance in Scripture as a Whole

Although the Kenites were a people outside Israel, they maintained friendly relations with Israel and lived at its side from the Exodus to the time of David. In this respect they are sometimes read as an example of Gentiles joining with the people of God. The Kenites are not mentioned directly in the New Testament.

Interpretation and Debated Issues

• The identity of Moses' father-in-law: Judges 4:11 calls Hobab Moses' father-in-law, whereas Numbers 10:29 introduces Hobab as the son of Raguel (Reuel). Proposed explanations include reading the Hebrew word more broadly as "brother-in-law" and accounting differently for the relationships among Jethro, Reuel, and Hobab.
• Relationship to Cain: In Numbers 24:22 the Kenites are referred to as "Cain" (Qayin). Consequently, a tradition has arisen linking the Kenites to Adam's son Cain as his descendants, but Scripture does not state this explicitly. Some interpreters see a wordplay in the word "nest" (Hebrew qen) in the same passage, which sounds similar to the name of the Kenites.
• Relationship to the Rechabites: On the basis of 1 Chronicles 2:55, it is widely accepted that the Rechabites, who kept their forefather's command in Jeremiah 35, were a branch of the Kenites.
• The Kenite hypothesis: Some critical scholars have proposed that Israel's worship of the LORD (Yahweh) was transmitted from the Kenites and Midianites through Jethro. Conservative evangelical and Reformed scholars reject this hypothesis as inconsistent with the record of revelation in Exodus.

In the Korean Church

The Kenites themselves are rarely the subject of sermons. They are more often mentioned as background when the stories of Jethro, Jael, or the Rechabites are discussed.