Word.ws English Dictionary

kyai

kyai noun: a Javanese Islamic cleric or expert on Islam.

Noun

kyai (plural kyais)

  1. A Javanese Islamic cleric or expert on Islam.
    • That the santri live in a boarding school where they are being supervised around the clock enhances the power of the kyai.2012, Charlene Tan, Islamic Education and Indoctrination: The Case in Indonesia, page 56
    • It was there that the kyai finally pulled down the cloth, slowly, bracing himself for the shock.2015, Eka Kurniawan, translated by Labodalih Sembiring, Man Tiger, Verso, page 19

Forms of kyai

pluralkyais

Questions about kyai

What does kyai mean?
Kyai means a Javanese Islamic cleric or expert on Islam.
What part of speech is kyai?
Kyai is a noun.
What is the plural of kyai?
The plural of kyai is kyais.

Words near kyai in the dictionary

  1. kyabakura
  2. Kyabram
  3. Kyabram South
  4. kyack
  5. kyacks
  6. kyai
  7. Kyaingtong
  8. kyais
  9. kyak
  10. Kyakhta
  11. kyaks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: kyai (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “kyai.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/kyai. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.