Retrofitting

There has been some definitional confusion as to how I'm using this term.

Webster's 9th collegiate p. 1008

«Retrofit - to furnish (a computer, airplane, or building) with new parts or equipment not available at time of manufacture

As I am using "retrofit"

Retrofit to furnish (a minhag, a svara or a chumra ) with new explanations or practices not available at the time of ('manufacture') original propagation

If any readers have a better term, I'd welcome their input.

EG

1) to treat Qitniyyot as "issur" in a taarovet instead of mere minhag/humra/ch'shash.

Since Qitniyyot were originally construed as ch'shash and not as issur, to assign them the valence of issur is "retrofitting" - or retrospectively seeing it through modern lenses instead of through the lenses of its own origins

2) Aveilut of S'fira - To assign issurim such as music, movies etc., as pertaining to the aveilut of s'fira; when original sources only ascribe
a) nissuin
b) tisporet
c) m'lachah of some kind
And nothing else

When this aveilut is not added for new reasons but read into original sources, it's retrofitting. If it has evolved due to subsequent tragedies, then it has evolved by taking on new aspects. It has been enhanced by history. That would not constitute "retrofitting" AIUI.

3) Shebchal halaylot anu ochlin hametz umatza.

Original sources assign this to "aviv m'lamdo" IE the Father or leader teaches this.

Since we now assign this reading to the youngest child, reading this new practice back into the mishnah is a form of retrofitting, because EG Rishonim were unaware of this p'shat

4. Waiting to NIGHT to daven maariv on first night of Shavuot.

Rishonim were unaware of this humra. If one reads this mamash back into the passuq - then one is "retrofitting" this term to use it in a way not originally anticipated.

5) Similarly adding Corn Syrup and Peanut Oil to the g'zeira of Qitnoyyot

6) In American History
Construing America's founding fathers as racially oppressive because they either tolerated slavery or engaged it in themselves could be retrofitting the 13th Amendment back to the 18th century

Indeed, while we should not applaud this behaviour, we cannot use today's post-Civil War yardstick to judge them fairly as they were THEN.

EG G Washington freed all his slaves at his death. Seen by today's standards, what took him so long? That would be a retrofit

Yet, seen by standards of his era, he was quite enlightened. EG T Jefferson himself failed to emulate this noble act.

7) In American Constitutional Law
to ban the use of the term "God" due to the 1st amendment, when the US motto is "In God We Trust" and it appears in the national anthem etc. IOW to see separation of Church and State to this extreme is revisionistic. To read it into the first amendment is simply "retrofitting" a Politically Correct state Atheism into the text of the Bill of Rights.

KT
RRW