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Ich habe diesen Satz in Deutschland gehört:

Auf dieses Leben.

Kann man das so alleine verwenden?

I have heard this term in German. Does it make sense when it stands alone? It seems to translate only to to this life. I cannot include much context information, because it was simply said by someone at random.

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  • Hi Anna, welcome to German.Stackexchange! You don't have to answer in German. Questions in English are perfectly fine. I corrected your German text (based on your English text) and wrote it as I would say it as native German. The translation of "make sense" is not so easy in German (see: german.stackexchange.com/questions/8132/…). "Sinn machen" is an anglicism, which is often used in German since a few years....
    – Iris
    Commented Jun 1, 2016 at 16:31
  • Also feel free to take a tour of the site. Visit the help center to learn more about how it works.
    – Jan
    Commented Jun 1, 2016 at 17:06
  • Das macht nur Sinn wenn an eine Wiedergeburt glaubt oder ein zweites, ewiges Leben, und davon ausgeht, dass es der Angesprochene auch glaubt. :) Oder im Urlaub vielleicht, wo man es sich gut gehen lässt, während man sonst gestresst ist, diese Form von Leben meinend.
    – user unknown
    Commented Dec 17, 2017 at 4:22

4 Answers 4

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Auf dieses Leben is a line of the song Auf uns by Andreas Bourani from 2014:

Ein Hoch auf uns

Auf dieses Leben

Auf dieses Leben is also a toast and with the song it became even more popular. Its meaning is more or less: Enjoy your life now (e.g. by celebration and drinking alcohol together), because we only live once.

So yes, as a toast Auf dieses Leben can stand alone.

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The German expression 'auf something' can be a short form of 'ein Hoch auf …' meaning to cheer for or toast to something. Most common is perhaps 'auf uns' in the meaning of '(a toast) to us'.

The current usage of the phrase 'auf dieses Leben' has probably been influenced by the text of Andreas Bourani's hit 'Auf uns' used as a promotional song for the soccer world championship 2014, in which the refrain starts with 'Ein Hoch auf uns, auf dieses Leben, …' roughly translated 'Cheers to us, to this life, …'.

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The expression might be derived from the Jewish toast "l'chaim" as it is relatively uncommon in German but a standard phrase in Jewish.

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  • Yiddish or Hebrew?
    – Jan
    Commented Jun 2, 2016 at 8:02
  • Urban dictionary says Jewish/Yiddish: urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=l%27chaim
    – Iris
    Commented Jun 2, 2016 at 8:40
  • l'chaim is both Hebrew and Yvrit (modern day Hebrew). Yiddish took the phrase from Hebrew. Yiddish is the English spelling of Jiddisch, which stems from Jüdisch, which in turn just means Jewish.
    – Ralph M. Rickenbach
    Commented Jun 3, 2016 at 12:15
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Ja, macht auf jeden Fall Sinn.

Zum Beispiel, wenn man mit jemandem anstößt. Dann sagt man sowas wie:

Auf unsere Zukunft.

oder

Auf uns.

oder eben auch

Auf dieses Leben.

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  • 2
    Macht Sinn... argh....
    – Robert
    Commented Jun 2, 2016 at 15:19

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