Page - 34 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 07/01

34 | Mark K. George www.jrfm.eu 2021, 7/1, 33–44 The metaphor of a path being fashioned from the commands, statutes, and ordinances expresses one of the important features of writing and books in religious traditions, or at least within this religious tradition. Writing creates governable subjects, in the sense of being subjects whose behavior is shaped by it. In the case of Deuteronomy, these subjects, called “Israel”, are loyal and docile subjects, obedient to what is written in the book. Their subjec- tivity is created in relationship to the book itself, as the path that sets out the practices and experiences individuals must enact in order to become the “Israel” of the book. This is achieved in part by affordances, or possibilities, writing offered to the writers of Deuteronomy that they then employed for Israel’s subjectivity. For many today, these affordances might seem obvious, but writing was a relatively new technology at the time Deuteronomy was being written. The possibilities of this technology took time to be realized and used. Deuteronomy provides evidence of that process. My argument begins with a brief discussion of affordances and the history of writing in ancient Israel. From this discussion I consider three of writing’s affordances of particular import in creating Israel’s subjectivity: fixing and stabilizing the commands, standardizing and normalizing them for Israel and its conduct, and using them in assessment mechanisms. Writing and texts seek to create certain types of subjects in religious traditions, even before they shape other religious practices and performances. Affordances and the Invention of Hebrew What is an affordance? James Gibson used the term to speak of those things in a physical environment that are offered (or, afforded) to an animal within it. Affordance refers to the relationship that exists between an animal and its environment, the complementarity of animal and environment.1 That en- vironment offers to the animal a set of possibilities for action that may be used and modified in certain ways. Affordances are not determinative of an animal’s actions, but rather are possibilities to be realized. Gibson’s idea quickly was adapted to different contexts and uses, across a range of fields. I draw upon it with respect to writing and books to recognize that these technologies are part of social life, what I consider the environ- ment of human life, both in the present day and in antiquity. Writing offers 1 Gibson 2015, 119.