Numbers 24:22

“Nevertheless the Kenite shall be wasted, etc.] Though they were so strongly fortified, and closely immured and surrounded with rocks and mountains, yet they should gradually waste away, as they were but few in Saul’s time, (<091506>1 Samuel 15:6) until Ashur shall carry thee away captive; Tiglathpileser, king of Assyria, when he carried captive the people of Syria, took these with them, (<121609>2 Kings 16:9), though Jarchi thinks they were carried captives with the ten tribes, that is, by Shalmaneser, king of Assyria; and the Targum of Jonathan, by Sennacherib, king of Assyria; and others think by Nebuchadnezzar, who was sometimes reckoned a king of Assyria; taking them to be the same with…”

“Render, For Kain shall surely not be destroyed (literally “be for destruction”) until Asshur, etc. The words are not, as they appear in the King James Version, a prediction of evil to the Kenites, but a promise, on the contrary, of safety to be long continued to them (compare Numbers 10:32; Jeremiah 35:19). return to 'Top of Page'”

“The Kenite - Heb. Kain, that is, the Kenite, so called, either by a transposition of letters, which is very usual in the Hebrew tongue; or from the name of some eminent place where they lived, or person from whom they were descended, though now the memory of them be utterly lost, as it hath fared with innumerable other places and persons, famous in their generations, mentioned in ancient Heathen writers. Shall be wasted - Shall be by degrees diminished by the incursions of divers enemies, till at last the Assyrian comes to compleat the work and carries them into captivity. For the Kenites who lived partly among the ten tribes, and partly with the two tribes, were carried captive with them,…”

“the Kenite: Heb. Kain, until Asshur shall carry thee away captive. or, how long shall it be ere Asshur carry thee away captive? Gen 10:11; Ezr 4:2; Psa 83:8; Hos 14:3 Numbers 24:23”