In adhering to rules to decide between competing legal opinions and codify the law, Caro and Isserles limited their own legal creativity. Both were free to craft the wording of their positions, however, Caro’s self-declared “majority rule” and Isserles’s dedication to legal principles such as hilketa’ ke-batra’y muffled their own voices. Solomon Luria was also bound by various principles, including precedent, received traditions, and majority rule, but by generally following reason to arbitrate between the views of earlier authorities Luria assumed a much more personal and dynamic role in codifying the law. This becomes clear through a comparison of their methods and conclusions in a number of cases.