Asking About Leaning

 This post is piggybacking off of this one of my father shlita. 

In the perush on the Haggadah attributed to the Rokeach and in the perush of the Gra they say that in the times of the mikdash there was no question about הסבה because that was the normal way of eating ,there was nothing strange and unique instead they asked about why they were eating only roasted meat.  It is only after there was no more pesach and it became not the norm to recline while eating that the question about the roast was replaced by the question about reclining.  They assume the question about הסבה is specifically because we normally do not recline. 

What is very interesting is back to back paragraphs in the perush attributed to the Raavan on the Haggadah which I shall paste here.

The Raavan says that since it is not the norm any more to recline we not do הסבה but in the very next paragraph he understands the answer of עבדים היינו only answers the question of the הסבה (the Shibulay Haleket also learns this way and adds that the other questions are answered by the רבן גמליאל היה אומר at the end of Maggid.)  It is clear that the Raavan must have הסבה as one of the questions of the מה נשתנה.  How could he understand that there is a question about הסבה if he himself says in the previous paragraph that we do not recline not that it not customary to eat that way?  

There are two ways to understand this view of the Raavan that nowadays we do not recline during the Seder.  Either the din of reclining is suspended or that regular eating in a chair is considered a fulfillment of הסבה.  The Raavan on Pesachim says:

Rav Eliyahu Baruch points out the Raavan does not say the din of הסבה no longer applies but rather that our eating while sitting is הסיבתינו, it is our הסבה.  In other words, the takanah is not to specifically eat in a reclining manner but rather to eat in a way that expresses חירות.  When that was done by reclining the obligation was to recline.  Nowadays that is fulfilled by sitting at a table with a chair.  If so, it makes a נפקא מינה if one ate while standing they will not fulfill their obligation because it is not a regular way to eat, it would not be fulfilling הסיבתנו.  He reports that he told this to Rav Elyashiv who agreed with him.  Based upon this we can explain that we still can ask about הסבה because we are forgoing it, we are just fulfilling it in another manner but it is still difficult for it is no different from the rest of the year, so what is the question of מה נשתנה?  

Since the Raavan holds the עבדים היינו comes to answer the question of הסבה it would seem he would also have to hold that this question was asked in the times of the mikdash.  This is the opinion of the Rambam (8:2) as well that lists five questions for the מה נשתנה including both הסבה and why only roast  (see however Tzafnas Paneach.)  But the Gra and Rokeach are logical why ask about reclining when it is the normal way to eat hoe can one disagree with this?  You could learn like the Shibulay Haleket that says the question is specifically כלנו מסובין, why everyone, including those that normally wouldn't recline like the waiter, woman and a child at their father's table are leaning.  However, the Raavan doesn't say that so it is hard to say he learnt that way.