The Themes of "Wasting Seed" and DNA Under Jewish Law

Another interesting argument that Jewish law has not fully addressed yet is the issue of taking a person's DNA without their permission and cloning a person. DNA can be easily taken from a person without them ever realizing it. DNA comes from any cells from the human body and cells such as hair or skin fall out constantly and could be retrieved to clone a new person. The question whether this is permissible under Jewish law has been raised. Halachic authorities on Jewish law have stated that there is a belief in some sort of copyright law or personal property ruling.

Under Jewish law it is prohibited from stealing another person's belongings. Taking a person's DNA and cloning a new person could be considered the stealing of DNA since they were not aware of what was happening and is therefore prohibited under Jewish law. Furthermore, the cloned person would still be granted all of the rights and privileges of a normal human being. This case is similar to a child born from a rape victim in that the child is treated like any other person in society.

Stem cell research has a similar stance under Jewish law as therapeutic cloning although there has not been an official ruling as of yet on stem cell research from Jewish authorities. Stem cell research can be broken down into several arguments, each of which Jewish law rules upon. The first premise to understand is that many of the rulings under Jewish law for abortion apply to stem cell research. Under stem cell research, pre-embryos, or a small group of cells making the early stages of a zygote after the first couple of days of conception, are used by stem cell research centers and many of them are discarded if they are not needed for the research being done. If a person kills a fetus under Jewish law, it is not considered to be murder because the fetus is not yet considered a full human being.