A question about Arabic

Submitted by Motke (Israel), Oct 3, 2012 at 09:51

I know very little Arabic, but I noticed that "in the presence of" is "في حضور". I wonder why this phrase, and others I encounter, seems so similar to its English counterpart. It's a word-by-word translation: in + presence. Is this similarity only a coincidence?

I apologize for asking this off-topic question here. I know of an Arabic forum on the net where I could ask this, but there are mainly Muslims there and they may not answer me truthfully (for some reason it's very hard for me to imagine them admitting (if that's indeed the case) that their language (are we talking about MSA here?) borrows constructs from the languages of the "infidels").

(As for the video: Well, I think it's cruel to publish it. Perhaps he had some wardrobe malfunction. Any person should be entitled to the "benefit of the doubt" at least once...)

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