(sing. kinah). Elegiac poems which express mourning, pain, and suffering; one of the most ancient types of liturgical poetry (Piyyut).
The Bible mentions various laments: Abraham for Sarah (Gen. 23:2), Jacob's sons for their father (Gen. 50:10), the Israelites for the prophet Samuel (I Sam. 25:1), David's famous lament over Saul and Jonathan: "The beauty of Israel is slain upon your high places: how are the mighty fallen ..." (II Sam. 3:33-34).
Apparently, different kinot were collected in a separate volume: "Behold, they are written in the lamentations" (II Chr. 35:25). The entire Book of Lamentations is a kinah and the sages called it "kinot" (JT, Shab. 15; Lev. R. 15:4).
The kinot could be recited by women keeners: "Consider, and call for the mourning women ... Let them make haste, and take up a wailing for us ... Teach your daughters wailing, and every one her neighbor lamentation" (Jer. 9:16, 19-25).
The Book of Lamentations is read on the night of 9 Av (Tishah Be-Av) and, according to certain customs, on the following morning as well. In the Septuagint, the book begins, "It came to pass after the exile of Judah and the destruction of Jerusalem, that Jeremiah sat and wept and lamented this kinah for Jerusalem." Over the course of time, many other kinot were written to be recited on 9 Av.
As a type, the kinot are a product of Erets Israel. Eliezer Kallir wrote many laments that occupy a prominent place in the books of laments used by Ashkenazi Jews. Using these books as a base, other kinot were added in the Middle Ages in Europe and in Oriental countries following the Crusades and other persecutions of the Jews.
Numerous kinot are known as "Zions," as they begin with the word "Zion." Expressing mourning for destroyed Zion and longing for its revival, they all followed the model of the lament of Judah Halevi, which begins, "Zion, shall you not ask ..." A noteworthy kinah was that composed by R. Meir of Rothenburg, "Sha'ali serufah ..." to commemorate the burning of the Talmud, which he witnessed in Paris in 1242.
The first book of kinot according to the Ashkenazi rite was printed in Cracow in 1585. Among Oriental Jewish communities, the kinot were printed in Seder Arba Ta'aniyyot (Venice, 1590), in the prayer book according to the Yemenite ritual (Tiklal), and in many others.
