[Avodah] Synthetic Meat - Responding to Questoins

[Nachum Binyamin Klafter, MD]

I shared my understanding of why synthetic meat should be considered parve 
(and therefore kal-ve-chomer why it is certainly not eiver min ha-chay).

The "meat" which will be ingested by the public, when this is mass produced 
for the consumer market, will never have been inside any animal whatsoever. 
All of its ingredients, literally every molecule, will have been synthesized 
in a Petri Dish with an augar medium from the following synthetic molecules: 
nucleic acids, amino acids, glucose, and trace minerals.  No animal will 
have served as the "source" of this meat.  The active genes of bovine heart 
muscle cells served only as a source of the information for these cells.

All of this is based on my assumption that the first cell which started this 
process was made from an embryonic bovine stem cell, which was fertilized in 
vitro.  (There may be other ways to accomplish synthetic meat, which might 
raise other halakhic challenges.  For example, if someone took a chunk of 
muscle fibers from a mature cow, and started with those, it is a different 
she'elah.  It still might be mutar, but there are different challenges to 
overcome.  But I am not addressing that possibility.)

One person privately asked me if it might be comparable to rennet, which is 
a concentrated solution of enzymes derived from the stomach of a cow.  It is 
not comparable to rennet, because Rennet is the actual substance which comes 
from the guf of the cow, and which actually curdles the milk.  In the case 
of synthetic meat there is actually ZERO substance from any animal.  It’s 
like a plant whose roots are growing in an artificial medium, which is now 
growing muscle tissue.  It’s not an animal and has never been connected to 
an animal.

Another person said that the original stem cell is a “davar ha-ma’amid” 
This is an extension of the Rennet question.  We are talking about a single 
microscopic embryonic stem cell, which is invisible to the naked eye.  We 
are talking about embryos which were fertilized in vitro.  They are not even 
an animal.  A single stem cell has no discernible metziyus to a human 
being –it has no ta’am, nutritional value, etc.  I do not think that a 
single cell can qualify as a davar ha-ma’amid, but in any case, this single 
cell comes from a glob of tissue which is already parve.

As a separate aside, the fact that the davar ha-ma'amid was not detectable 
DOES help, as I understand it.  For a davar ha-ma'amid to render the final 
product treif, it needs to actually be food.  If it is nipsal me-achilas 
kelev or rendered into something which is no longer food, then it is no 
longer a davar assur, and it is no longer a problem of davar ha-ma'amid. 
So, a single milliliter of water with some buffer solution in it is simply a 
chemical solution.  The fact that a microsopic cell is in this chemical 
reagent does not turn it into food.  It remains a flavorless chemical 
reagent.  At least that is my understanding.

Another person wrote to me that perhaps it’s an issue of chatacha na’asit 
ke-neveila.  I think this is incorrect for the same reason – the original 
substance was not neveila, but was a microscopic cell from a microscopic 
glob in a labroatory.

Another person compared it to be paku’ah (the meat of a the fetus of an 
unborn calf which is in the cow at the time of her slaughter).  Chazal made 
a gezeira on ben-paku’ah being eaten with milk because of mar’is ayin. 
Therefore, the question is whether the gezeira would apply to synthetic 
“meat”.  I think that answer to this is definitely “no” for a number of 
reasons:  The synthetic meat was never a cow and does not resemble meat in 
any manner.  Synthetic meat looks like white pieces of tofu. There’s no 
blood in it.  It doesn’t not resemble real meat in any way.  The meat of a 
ben paku’ah looks just like veal.  But more fundamentally, the sages did not 
make the gezeira of ben paku’ah on synthetic meat.  They made the gezeira on 
a fetal calf.

Another question is basar-of (chicken cooked with milk).  But again, we 
cannot enact new gezeiras.  Even if you imagine that the sages would have 
made a gezeira on synthetic meat, they did not make such a gezeira and one 
can’t be made now.  And my intuition is that they would not have made such a 
gezeira on synthetic meat, but that is a highly arguable theoretical 
question which I think is irrelevant because we do not enact new gezerias in 
our times.

I am only making this disclaimer because people tend to go crazy about these 
things:  I am not a rov and I do not claim to be rauy le-hora'ah.  I am just 
sharing my thoughts for the purpose of conversation.

Nachum Klafter