קֵינִי
Kenite
BDB lists 2 entries for ‘Kenite’ fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Noun
- A naming word — a person, place, thing, or idea.
Noun type
- Gentilic
- A noun naming a member of a people, tribe, or region of origin (e.g. an Israelite, a Moabite).
- Proper
- A name of a specific person, place, or people (e.g. Abraham, Zion, Israel).
State
- Absolute
- The independent form of a noun, not bound to a following word.
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
- Plural
- More than one (in Hebrew, generally three or more).
Every verse where H7017 appears in the Book of 1 Samuel — 3 distinct verses. Click any verse to open its interlinear word-by-word view. Verse text shown in the World English Bible for context — . Each verse’s Hebrew form is shown with its reference; the English is not keyword-highlighted, since the data carries no word-level English alignment. Use “Compare translations” on any verse to read it across multiple English versions. This concordance covers the Hebrew Bible; Septuagint (Greek Old Testament) occurrences are not indexed here.
1 Samuel
- 1 Samuel 15:6 הַ/קֵּינִ֡י קֵינִ֖י ptcl def.art + n Gentilic ms n Gentilic ms Saul said to the Kenites, Go, depart, get you down from among the Amalekites, lest I destroy you with them; for you shown kindness to all the children of Israel, when they came up out of Egypt. So the Kenites departed from among the Amalekites.
- 1 Samuel 27:10 הַ/קֵּינִֽי ptcl def.art + n Gentilic ms Achish said, Against whom have you made a raid today? David said, Against the South of Judah, and against the South of the Jerahmeelites, and against the South of the Kenites.
- 1 Samuel 30:29 הַ/קֵּינִֽי ptcl def.art + n Gentilic ms and to those who were in Racal, and to those who were in the cities of the Jerahmeelites, and to those who were in the cities of the Kenites,
About this entry
At a glance — auto-summarized from this page’s data, not written by a person. Every figure links to its source below. This summary describes the numbers; it doesn’t interpret them.
קיני (Qêynîy) is a Hebrew name most often rendered “Kenite.” Scripture first uses it in Genesis 15:19. It turns up in 10 verses across 5 books, an uncommon footprint. It concentrates in Judges, which alone accounts for 40% of its uses. The sections below give every occurrence and version rendering.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H7017 catalogs a Hebrew word from the Hebrew Old Testament.
These counts are not copied from any lexicon or concordance. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged Hebrew Old Testament. What Lemma adds →
- 10
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 10 distinct verses.
- 5 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 5 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #2,001
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 2,001 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 10 occurrences in the concordance →
By section of the Old Testament
By traditional corpus
Conventional, traditional groupings — biblical authorship is debated, so this is a traditional corpus grouping, not an authorship claim. Each share is this word’s portion of its verses in that division of the Hebrew canon. Each figure is a share of the word’s 10 distinct verses.
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 7 verses · 70%
- Torah (Pentateuch) 2 verses · 20%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 1 verse · 10%
How translations render this word
Counts come from each version’s own published word-to-Strong’s tagging or interlinear alignment — an approximate guide to how each version renders this word, not a word-level alignment the data otherwise carries. Because each total is that version’s own tagged count, the per-version totals vary from one another and need not match the appearance or distinct-verse counts above. These counts may also differ from a printed concordance because Lemma counts each distinctly tagged rendering and does not collapse phrase taggings into a single head-word total. This is a fixed set of word-tagged versions (KJV, ASV, BSB, ULT) and does not change with the reading translation you choose elsewhere. Each version’s license is shown beside its name below (and on Sources).
BDB lists this Strong’s number as 4 distinct words (homographs). Each count above pools all of them and is not split by sense — see the Senses section below. A low-frequency rendering may belong to a different one of those words, not the primary meaning.
- King James Version†: Kenites 6×, Kenite 5×
- American Standard Version†: Kenite 7×, Kenites 4×
- Berean Standard Bible†: Kenite 5×, Kenites 5×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text†: Kenite 10×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H7017 across 13† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 2 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders H7017 across 13† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 2 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders H7017 across 12† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 2 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H7017 across 13† tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 3 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Senses in the full BDB
What do BDB’s symbols mean?
BDB uses these scholarly abbreviations:
| Symbol | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 𝔊 | the Septuagint (the ancient Greek translation, LXX) |
| 𝔙 | the Vulgate (the Latin translation) |
| 𝔖 | the Syriac version (the Peshitta) |
| 𝔗 | the Targum (the Aramaic translation) |
| ψ | the Psalms |
| √ | root (the underlying root or stem) |
| ‖ | parallel passage (a synonymous or contrasted parallel) |
| † | the dagger: every passage where the word occurs is cited |
The 2 senses and sub-senses the full Brown-Driver-Briggs lexicon distinguishes for this word, in lexicon order (not ranked by frequency), with BDB’s own verbatim wording and sub-sense lettering. Shown in Hebrew script with BDB’s own scholarly abbreviations. The condensed entry is in the Lexicon Entry tab. See also the Forms in the corpus table below.
קיני I [m.] spear 𝔊 and most
קיני II
- 1. gent. (v. StaG i. 131 f. MeyEntstehung 115; cf. Arabic n.pr.fam. قَيْن; Nab. Sin. n.pr.m. et. f. קינו; tribe of smiths?);—tribe of Moses’ father-in-law Ju 4:11 (cf. קֵינִי 1:16), Καινα, 𝔊L Κειν; akin to Midian (Nu 10:29 P), settled among Amal. in S. of Canaan (v. קֵינִי); prophesied against by Balaam Nu 24:22 (קָ֑יִן; JE);—v. also קֵינִי. e.g. Judges 4:11
- 2. loc. הַקַּ֫יִן, in S. Judah (a settlement of ii. ק׳ 1?);—Jos 15:57, [Ζακαν]αειμ, A [Ζανω] Ακειμ, 𝔊L [Ζανου] Ακεν; poss. = Ẏŭḳîn SE. from Hebron [RobBR ii. 85] (v. BuhlGeogr. 162 f. who, however, cp. קִינָה v 22). e.g. Joshua 15:57
קיני III m. Cain, Καιν, eldest son of Adam and Eve (expl. Gn 4
קיני IV of ii. קַיִן 1 (q.v.), חֶבֶר הַקּ׳ (dwelling in N. Isr.), ὁ Κειναῖος, Ju 4
Senses from the full Brown-Driver-Briggs lexicon (Brown, Driver, Briggs; Oxford 1906 — public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). Full attribution on Sources.
Word origin
I. n.[m.] spear 𝔊 and most;—sf. קֵינוֹ 2 S 21:16; קוֹבָעוֹ (cf. 1 S 17:38) Klo Bu HPS al.
III. n.pr.m. Cain, Καιν, eldest son of Adam and Eve (expl. Gn 4:1 from קָנָה acquire; but in fact = ii. ק׳, as heros eponymos, according to WeComp. 11 StaG 285 ff. BuUrg. 193 Holz Gn 50 f. especially StaZAW xiv (1894), 250 ff.; xv (1895), 157 ff., CheEncy. Bib. cain);—ק׳ Gn 4:1, 2, 3, 5(×2), 8(×2), 9, 13, 15(×2), 16, 17, קָ֑יִן v 6, 24, 25 (all J).
I. adj.gent. of ii. קַיִן 1 (q.v.), חֶבֶר הַקּ׳ (dwelling in N. Isr.), ὁ Κειναῖος, Ju 4:11, 17(×2); 5:24 (against WMM Jen, who ref. ק׳ here to city Kîn near Megiddo, mentioned by Egyptian, v. especially Bu Now on 4:11); read prob. also חֹבָב הַקּ׳ 1:16 (for בְּנֵי ק׳; so Bu GFM; 𝔊 οἱ υἱοὶ Ιοθορ τοῦ Κειναίου); elsewhere as n. gent. coll. הַקּ׳ settled among Amal., Nu 24:21 (JE; v. ii. קַיִן 1), 1 S 15:6— = קֵינִי v 6 (We Bu Kit קַיִן, HPS הַקֵּינִי);—הַקּ׳ also 27:10; 30:29 (B 𝔊L Κενεζ(ε)ι = קְנִזִּי; A Κηνει, Κειναῖος); Gn 15:19 (list of peoples; R); = הַקִּינִים 1 Ch 2:55 (Κ(ε)ιναῖοι), related to Rechabites.
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from קין (Qayin) (H7014) — Cain.
Jastrow Dictionary
A second Hebrew/Aramaic lexicon for comparison, covering Aramaic and post-biblical (Talmudic, Targumic, Midrashic) usage that the biblical-Hebrew BDB does not. Matched by lemma rather than by Strong’s number, so a lemma may carry more than one Jastrow headword (shown separately below), and the entries cover usage well beyond the Bible.
קֵינַי
- (v. קוּן; cmp. תובל קין Gen. IV, 2 e.g. Genesis 4:2
- 2. artist, esp. metal-worker, silversmith. Targ. Jer. X, 9 (h. text צורף). Targ. Ps. LXVI, 10 קינאה (ed. Wil. קֵנָ׳). Targ. Jud. XVII, 4; a. fr.—Y. B. Bath. II, beg. 13ᵇ אין הוה כגון ק׳ וכ׳ if a workshop has been there before, e. g. that of a silversmith or a smith &c.—Pl. קֵינָאֵי. Targ. Esth. V, 14 ית נגרייא וית ק׳ the carpenters and the forgers of arms. Ib. קַיְינָאֵי דמתקנין וכ׳ ed. Lag. (oth. ed. קייצ׳, corr. acc.) the smiths, that they may make a knife. Ib. ולקיינ׳ ed. Lag. (oth. ed. ולקיצ׳, corr. acc.). Targ. II Esth. I, 2 וכל קינאי ed. Lag. (oth. ed. קניגייא, corr. acc.).
קֵינִי
- Ḳeni (v. Neub. Géogr., p. 276). Ohol. XVIII, 9.
A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature (Marcus Jastrow; London, Luzac, 1903) — Public Domain. Digitized via Sefaria. Digitized via Sefaria. Full attribution on Sources.
Forms in the corpus
The 9 distinct written forms H7017 takes in the Hebrew Bible, most frequent first — each parse links to that state’s occurrences in the concordance. Hebrew forms include their vowel points and cantillation, so a single lemma takes many written forms.
| Form | Parsing | Example | Uses |
|---|---|---|---|
| הַ/קֵּינִֽי | Noun, Gentilic, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | 1 Samuel 27:10 | 3 |
| הַ/קֵּינִ֑י | Noun, Gentilic, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Judges 4:17 | 2 |
| הַ/קֵּינִי֙ | Noun, Gentilic, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Genesis 15:19 | 2 |
| הַ/קִּינִ֣ים | Noun, Gentilic, Masculine, Plural, Absolute | 1 Chronicles 2:55 | 1 |
| הַ/קֵּינִ֔י | Noun, Gentilic, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Numbers 24:21 | 1 |
| הַ/קֵּינִ֡י | Noun, Gentilic, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | 1 Samuel 15:6 | 1 |
| מִ/קַּ֔יִן | Noun, Proper | Judges 4:11 | 1 |
| קֵינִ֖י | Noun, Gentilic, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | 1 Samuel 15:6 | 1 |
| קֵינִי֩ | Noun, Gentilic, Masculine, Singular, Absolute | Judges 1:16 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other BDB entries built from the same root as H7017, grouped by Strong’s listed origin. These share a root / origin per the lexicon — not necessarily a shared meaning. Each links to that word’s own entry.
Derives from
Proper names from this root
People and places named from this root — a name, not an additional meaning of the word.
Compare all same-root words → 2 of the same-root words are proper names (people or places). They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 10 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 10 Hebrew verses it occurs in. You can read those verses in Greek by switching the Old Testament edition to the Septuagint.
Read these verses in the Septuagint
This is a verse-level parallel only — the same verses exist in both the Hebrew and Greek Old Testaments. No word-level Hebrew↔Greek correspondence is claimed: the data carries no such alignment, so no Greek word is shown as this Hebrew word’s translation. Coverage is not total — the Septuagint omits the deuterocanon and renumbers the Psalms, so some Hebrew verses have no direct Greek parallel.
