When can I use der/die/das: Need help understanding

Question

I was trying to translate the sentence - This is the most beautiful flower in the garden.

The app showed:

Das ist die schönste Blume im Garten.

Question 1: Can we use "Das" instead of "That"? I thought, der/die/das was used instead of "the" and there is no exception.

I understand that in German, the choice between the definite articles "der," "die," and "das" depends on the gender (masculine, feminine, or neuter) and case (nominative, accusative, dative, genitive) of the noun they accompany.

I had translated the sentence to: Diese ist die schönste Blume im Garten however I have been told

Diese Blume ist die schönste im Garten" is the correct translation

But, I don't understand why.

Question 2: Please help me with the correct translation and also explain why my translation is incorrect.

Answer 1

Es and das at the beginning of a main clause are often expletives — fillers. They don't refer to any particular item in the clause directly. So they are not declined to match that item. But they are only put there to have something in front of the verb in second position. So that verb is in fact in second position. Another word that resembles this even more closely is dies.

Es/Das/Dies ist die schönste Blume im Garten.

Das is a pointing finger to the thing referred to, and dies is even more pointy. Compare that and this. Es on the contrary is very weak, as in It is the most …

Diese ist die schönste Blume im Garten.

This is also correct but it says This one is the most beautiful flower in the garden. rather than This is the most … as Diese refers to the subject in an even more definite manner.

Diese Blume ist die schönste im Garten.

This on the other hand means This flower is the most beautiful one in the garden.

In short:

• it — es
• that — das
• this — dies
• this one — dieser/diese/dieses
• that one — jener/jene/jenes

Answer 2

All the definite articles can also be used as demonstrative pronouns, in which case they mean something like "that". So "Das ist die schönste Blume im Garten." is a good sentence.

"Diese ist die schönste Blume im Garten." = "This one is the most beautiful flower in the garden."

"Diese Blume ist die schönste im Garten." = "This flower is the most beautiful one in the garden."

So all your example sentences are grammatically perfectly fine.

Answer 3

Der, die, das - the articles - are a bit more versatile than their English counterpart the. They can perform the following functions:

• the article function

  Der Mann ist gross
  Die Frau hält das Kind an der Hand
  Das Essen war sehr lecker

• the relative pronoun function

  Der Mann, der gerade hereinkommt, ist mein Vater
  Die Frau, die dort hinten steht, ist meine Mutter
  Das Mädchen, das nach vorne geht, ist meine Schwester

• the demonstrative pronoun function

  Der [/dieser] Mann ist der Täter!
  Die Frau hat nicht bezahlt!
  Das ist die schönste Blume im Garten.