Ben wrote:portrays lay practice before significant contact with the west.
This is why I read it, as well. It isn't so much noting a here or a there, either, but simply noting what's differently placed, due to the above.
A monastic would have simply taught satipatthana; this manual was, as the introduction notes, for layfolk without any background in Buddhism at all, and as such begins in an appropriate place, discussing Sila in detail.
It's a cosmological pedagogy that, often, simply doesn't work with many modern folk, however, which is one reason why meditation has come to the fore, I think. Discussing Sila as an adornment for the mind, instead of as a cosmological velocity, is also more useful to hear about in many modern contexts.