I'm aware this was a boringly predictable location in which to feel the spine-shiver of something beyond words (transcendent? divine?).
However, Abdullah was perhaps the first Saudi ruler to seek a new legitimacy, this time emanating from serving the people rather than simply applying divine law.
In conversation, the traditionalists appear to be hoping for a divine and dramatic intervention.
"There is however no reason to conclude that [Sutcliffe's] claim that he genuinely believed that he was acting under divine instructions to fulfill God's will carries any greater conviction now than it did when it was rejected by the jury," said Lord Judge.
The man himself paid little attention to all that, reading few of the countless analyses that sought to divine the ceremony's true meaning.
"The bigger tribes feel they have the divine right to rule others in Nigeria.
Hill of Doors (Picador) is a companion piece to his superb The Wrecking Light (2010): it portrays human conciousness caught between animal impulse and divine aspiration, trapped in a thuggishly material world that is oblivious to higher concerns.
Although he gave no names, many of the 18 were easy enough to divine; no shabby bleep test result could ever deny Gigi Buffon or Andrea Pirlo their place on the plane to Brazil.
Success on the battlefield was a signal of divine favour to govern, and martial valour was a vital accompaniment to monarchical power.
From the way I tried to divine the contents of the books purely from their physical appearances, with no sense of authors or titles, I would guess that I had read little or nothing before then.
"The big bang, which is today posited as the origin of the world, does not contradict the divine act of creation; rather, it requires it," the pope said in an address to a meeting at the pontifical academy of sciences.
