The Spirit possesses this inherent character as a Spirit of joy because He is essentially the element of the life to come. This leads to the observation that in the third place (c) the joyfulness of the early Christian consciousness must be explained in the light of the fact that the Christian state is felt to be semi-eschatological, i.e. in many important respects an anticipation of the consummated life of the Kingdom of God. Through the entrance of the Messiah into glory, through His pneumatic