iddah means the period for which a woman must wait after the death of her spouse, or after a divorce, before she can remarry. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 86 out of 100.
Why this word is great
IDDAH — [Noun] In Islamic law, the prescribed waiting period a woman must observe after the death of her spouse or after a divorce before she may remarry. From Arabic عِدَّة (ʿidda), meaning 'number, count, period'. Unlike 'mourning'—a boundless, inward expression of sorrow—or 'celibacy'—a chosen, often indefinite abstention—iddah is a precise, compulsory interlude, a legal and spiritual architecture of suspension calibrated for certainty of lineage. It is the three menstrual cycles counted in solitude, the four months and ten nights marked by the absence of adornment, the pregnancy carried to its term—a ritualized geometry imposed upon the raw arithmetic of the heart. This is the quiet room where one life has ended and the next is not yet permitted to begin.
noun
- The period for which a woman must wait after the death of her spouse, or after a divorce, before she can remarry.