Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Yigal Levin" <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>]

Dear Anonymous,
Please sign your posts. While this is not mandatory on this list (it is on
many others), it makes it easier to relate to your questions and to carry on
a real discussion.

> 1) The term Kenite (kayin) is spelled exactly the same as
> the name of Adam's son Cain (kayin).  Does this mean that
> the Kenites are supposed to be decendents Cain.

You are correct. Cain and Kenite are spelled the same in Hebrew (QYN). A
litteral reading of biblical history, however, would make it impossible for
the later Kenites to be descended from Cain son of Adam, since all of Cain's
descendents perished in the Flood, leaving only Noah, a descendant of Seth
(see Gen. 5).

However other aproaches would consider Cain to be an eponymous archetypical
farmer (Gen. 4:2) ancestor of Jabal, the eponymous archetypical shepherd
(verse 20), and of Tubal-Cain, the eponymous archetypical metalworker (verse
22). The later "Kenites" seem to have some of those charicteristics.

>
> 2) The plural of Kenite (kayin) is confusing.  In Judges
> 4:11 Heber is called *the kenite* (ha-keyniy).  The context
> seems singular but the spelling looks plural. The same is
> true in Judges 5:24. In contrast, Genesis 15:19 and 1Sa
> 15:6 the context and spelling both seem plural.
>
> 3) Conversely in the same passage says Heber moved away
> from the kenites (Kayin).  Here it the context seem plural
> but the spelling looks singular.
>
> What am I missing?

What you're missing is the genetilic. In other words, "Qyn/Qyny" is both the
name of a "tribe" (or maybe several tribes) and of that tribe's eponymous
ancestor. Just like "Moab" ("Moabite") is sometimes used in the singular and
sometimes in the plural, but always means "the People of Moab". In fact,
think of the English "people", which is strictly speaking a plural, but is
used as meaning "nation" (singular).

Yigal