In contrast to English which has two different words "happy" and "lucky" German has only one word of neutral gender: Das Glück. In German happiness is seen as part of luck. If you want to show the difference in meaning the verb after Glück can help to disambiguate:
Glück haben means be lucky (noun + verb to have)
Glücklich sein means to be happy (adjective + to be)
The English word luck is related to German g(e)lücke,"fortune, good luck." Probably borrowed in English as a gambling term.
The adjective always refers to happines as happiness is seen as a quality whereas the noun refers to luck. There are some nouns whcih refer to happiness like Freude or Freulichkeit but they are semantically a bit different. Freude might be more forceful than happiness and Freulichkeit may refer to merriness.
In addition German has a lot of word combinations like Viel Glück: all the best, Glückspilz: lucky devil, Glück im Unglück: a blessing in disguise, Glückwunsche: congratulations
Often the word "Schwein" pig related to English swine iinformally replaces Glück: Schwein gehabt: I was lucky which can also mean it was a narrow escape.
Comments
Language's internals
These are more things in heaven and earth, Jdibrahim,
that are dreamt of on your philosophy. Moot point, after all.Language's internals, you know?
O my god you're lucky, so lucky...
"He had white horses, and ladies by the score
All dressed in satin, and waiting by the door
He went to fight wars, for his country and king
Of his honor and his glory, the people would sing...
Oh, what a lucky man, he was...".
Lost in translation!
We also have jobs in our government, whose word combination are misunderstood by the employee. It might be useful, to declare him the task.
For example: Minister of foreign affairs ;-).
foreign = fremd
affairs = Angelegenheiten
The Return of the Manticorin .....
Also, ich bin schwer beeindruckt! Sie haben ja genau die gleiche Stimme wie Greg Lake!
Ich bin gleich runter in den Keller und habe meine 12-Saitige geholt. Und Sie begleitet! Natürlich haben Sie gleich gehört, daß das Ding nicht ganz korrekt gestimmt war.
Es kam einfach zu überraschend.
Ich schlage vor, wir wiederholen das nächsten Samstag mit "Yesterday man" von Chris Andrews.
Ich übe bis dahin fleißig auf der Posaune ....
1. There is not
such a thing as 'Freulichkeit' in german language.
Probably you thought of 'Erfreulichkeit', more common as 'erfreulich' or 'erfreuen'?
Wordly translated it would be s.th. like 'make-happy-ness' ...;-)...