On the appeal to tradition:
R. Eliezer says: If they had not brought the circumcision knife on the eve of Sabbath it may be brought openly on the Sabbath; and in time of danger a man may cover it up in the presence of witnesses. R. Eliezer said moreover: They may cut wood [on the Sabbath] to make charcoal in order to forge an iron implement. R. Akiba laid down a general rule: Any act of work that can be done on the eve of Sabbath does not override the Sabbath, but what cannot be done on the eve of the Sabbath overrides the Sabbath.
Shabbath 19.1 in William Klein, Introduction to Biblical Interpretation (Dallas: Word, 1993), 24.
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