Arabic saying

[EASTLANDS]

What is the Arabic word meaning "In the name of God"B-S-A-L-H

[delilahcat]

Bismillah

[Xollob]

Thank you, delilahcat. After all these years I am now closer to understanding Bohemian Rhapsody.

[Artemis]

Ah, The DT GK crossword. Finished it for the first time last Sat. Any more you wish to know?

[Peter Pedant]

Blimey explain the Bohemian rhapsody to me. i could never understand why bismillah featured.

The phrase is an amalgam of three words

bi.....ism(u) .....Allah(u)

Allahu is in the genitive  -    allahi - of god

and the short u elides with the big A of Allah,

ismullahi - the name of God   (an idafa construction I think)

Finally the two i's of bi and ism elide but then ism has to take a genitive itself  ism(u) becomes ism(i)

bismillahi

The Egyptians ignore all the final vowels which are unstressed (like the final vowels in Anglo-Saxon actually) which makes life easier but it is very obvious that the Egyptians do not speak Classical Arabic

All the surahs (chapters) of K or would that be Q begin bismillahi al rahman al raheem (Oh God I havent told you about the huruf shamsiyya!) and this makes it even more incomprehensible why it is in Bohemian rhapsody

[jno]

It's there because it sounds nice. Like mamma mia and beelzebub