Friday, July 26, 2019

halacha - Will editing genome of embryo having Jewish parents diminish Jewish status of later child?



There's a dreadful genetic illness known as Tay-Sachs requiring two carriers to activate the fatal effects in a child.



Probably, in reaction to the 20th century eugenics movement and its terrible results, I seems most poskim would be against any alteration of the human genome for any reason, and probably forbid it for their communities, in the name of the sanctity of human life.


There will come a time when humanity develops the technology to edit a child's genome, and to also completely identify the key genes responsible for full-blown Tay-Sachs.


Assuming two Jewish parents desired to conceive a child using IVF from which the Tay-Sachs had been edited out along the way, would this still be forbidden?


If so, would only the parents suffer the moral consequences? Or would any Jewish child whose genome had been edited in any manner even for therapeutic purposes, no longer be considered fully Jewish (i.e. mamzer or karet) as a deterrent against such an action?




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