I doubt there was a need back then to spell out everything that is not allowed, like now days seems to be the case. In fact I hear people on these forums often state if it isn’t spelled out as strictly forbidden, then it is allowed. The GIRM would be the largest book in the world if that was the case.
Indeed. Americans, I think, like legal codes with everything laid out as a set of black-and-white rules, though that has never really been the Roman way of doing things. People are simply expected to exercise good judgment; and if something becomes enough of a problem, then a rule
will be made in necessary.
Of course, when people don’t understand this, it presents difficulties. For instance, with the
orans position during the Our Father – one side says “It is not prescribed in the rubrics,” the other side says “But
no posture is prescribed in the rubrics, so if being unprescribed made a posture forbidden as you say, then the folded hands posture would be forbidden as well.” The first side rejoins, “And if
you were right, then doing jumping jacks would also be permitted, because no one has gotten around to banning it yet.” As I say, that’s not the way Rome works, which means that these discussions can rarely be solved by reference to some legalistic formula like “whatever is not expressly forbidden is allowed” or vice versa.
Thus, whether or not something is “in the rubrics” is an important starting point for the discussion, but usually not an ending point. The fact that, as you say, COTT and the the kneeling posture are not in the rubrics of the 1962 form is an important fact to be aware of, even though it does not close the book on the topic. It is also relevant, inter alia, to questions of whether contrary practices are “indults” (reprieves from a law), which for some reason is a legalistic shibboleth of great importance to certain people.
