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I

Idumaeans

The inhabitants of Idumaea (Edom), who during intertestamental times continued to inhabit a large area east and south of the Dead Sea.

intercalation

The addition of an extra month to the lunar year in order to adjust it more closely to the solar year. The lunar year is 11 days shorter than the solar year. To partially compensate for this difference, the rabbis would intercalate a month at the end of the year twice in every seven years. This was necessary to keep the various holidays falling in their proper seasons.

intertestamental

The period between the end of the time described in the latest books of the Hebrew Bible and the opening of the New Testament.

Iron Age II

Archaeological term for the period, particularly for Palestine, from the beginning of the United Monarchy (ca. 1200 - 1000 BCE) to the Babylonian Exile , 586 BCE, corresponding roughly to the First Temple period. Some modern scholars bring the Bronze Age forward to include the reign of Solomon so that the Iron Age starts closer to 900 BCE than to 1000 BCE. This is reasonable because the later part of the Bronze Age was a time of relative prosperity and that is more in accordance with the state of the court of Solomon than the rather austere style of the later Iron Age sites that have been excavated.