To the God-inspired men who wrote the Bible, Earth was the centre of the universe God created for us. Prophets and kings would have found it easy to imagine a sovereign atop the clouds ruling his dominions, sending emissary angels to encourage or rebuke wandering desert nomads. How dramatically this clashes with our “modern” perspective in which our dear green and blue planet is so infinitely tiny as to almost surpass imagination. And there, perhaps, is the key.