At the time of their announcement, Rabbi Yuval Cherlow of the Tzohar Rabbinical Organization advocated for certifying such meat grown from pig cells as kosher. In an interview on Hebrew-language Y-Net, Cherlow was quoted as saying that “cloned meat produced from a pig shall not be defined as prohibited for consumption – including with milk.”

“[The] cell of a pig is used and its genetic material is utilized in the production of food, the cell in fact loses its original identity and therefore cannot be defined as forbidden for consumption,” Cherlow said. “It wouldn’t even be meat, so you can consume it with dairy.”

Rabbi Cherlow’s reasons were humanitarian, “so that people would not starve, to prevent pollution, and to avoid the suffering of animals.”

“Halachic thought should examine the needs of all humanity, not only one’s own case,” he said.

Rabbi Cherelow’s opinion seems consistent with Rabbi Gerlack’s ruling In 2013 in which he said that meat from a lab-grown hamburger could be consumed with dairy products, although halacha, religious Jewish law, forbids it in meat produced from a live animal. In light of Rabbi Genack’s ruling on Impossible Pork, it very well may be that he does not agree that lab-grown pork will be certified as kosher.

In a commentary on Rabbi Cherlow’s statements, Rabbi Pini Dunner noted a number of medieval rabbinic commentaries on the verse that proscribes pig meat for Torah-observant Jews (Lev. 11:7). The rabbinic commentaries quote a Midrashic source as saying, “Why is [the pig] called chazir (חזיר) ? Because it is destined to be returned [“lachazor”] to permitted status.” Rabbi Pinner gave as one possible explanation a teaching by  Rabbi Moses Sofer of Pressburg, who suggested that pork will be permitted for consumption after the Messiah arrives, because at that stage pigs will evolve into ruminant animals, like cows and sheep, which will remove the impediment for their permissibility.

But Rabbi Dunner preferred a more simple reading of the rabbinic texts.

“Perhaps this ancient prediction was never talking about pigs becoming kosher once the Messiah had arrived, but rather it was telling us that when it becomes possible for Jews to eat pig meat …” Rabbi Dunner wrote.  “When lab-grown pork hits the market – it will be time for us to look out for the Messiah’s arrival.”

Rabbis point to the basis for lab-grown meat as being in the Talmud. In tractate Sanhedrin 59b, the rabbis discuss “meat that descended from heaven”.

They tell of Rabbi Shimeon ben Chalafta, who was walking on the road when lions came and roared at him. He quoted, “The young lions roar for prey and beg their food from God” (Psalms 104:21), and two lumps of meat fell from heaven. The lions ate one and left the other. Rabbi ben Chalafta brought a piece of this meat to the study hall and asked: Is this fit to eat or not? The scholar answered: “Nothing unfit descends from heaven.” Rabbi Zera asked Rabbi Abbahu: “What if something in the shape of a donkey were to descend?” He replied: “You howling bird, did they not say that no unfit thing descends from heaven?”

The same tractate, on page 65b, deals with a similar issue, reading: “Rabbi Chanina and Rabbi Oshaia would spend every Sabbath eve studying the Sefer Yetsirah (Book of Creation, one of the early books of Kabbala) by means of which they created a calf and ate it.”

Rabbi Yeshayah Halevi Horowitz, a 16th-century rabbinic authority, ruled that meat created in an unnatural manner, such as by Kabbalistic methods,  is not considered a real animal and does not need ritual slaughtering. The Malbim, a 19th century Torah scholar,  commented that meat created this way is not considered meat and can be eaten with milk. He suggested that this is the type of meat Abraham offered the angels (Genesis 17:7-8), and was, therefore, able to serve them milk at the same time.

However, A closer look at the new technology of growing meat in labs shows that some of the techniques may still violate one of the seven Noahide laws, a set of imperatives which according to the Talmud, were given by God as a binding set of laws for the “children of Noah” – that is, all of humanity. If growing lab meat is in violation of one of the Noahide laws, then the food product is forbidden for Jews and non-Jews alike.

Rabbi Moshe Avraham Halperin of the Machon Mada’i Technology Al Pi Halacha (the Institute for Science and Technology According to Jewish Law) noted that even though the technology is cutting edge, the Biblical principles have already been delineated by rabbis.

“The main question is whether to relate to the cells used as part of the animal from which they were taken,” Rabbi Halperin told Breaking Israel News.

“Individual cells are not normally considered a living organism for Halachic purposes,” he continued. “The end product is also so different from the donor that it could be considered a new being. But here, we have cells that increase until they represent a significant mass.”

Rabbi Halperin noted that there was a reason to allow Jews to consume “meat” of cells taken from a non-Kosher animal.

“The Torah forbids us from eating these forbidden foods, but the main aspect of eating is taste,” he explained. “Even though it looks like meat and tastes somewhat like meat when it is first made, it does not taste exactly like meat taken from the animal.”

Rabbi Halperin emphasized, however, that if cells are considered as being part of the donor animal, it would have implications for Jews and non-Jews alike.

“Taking living cells from a living animal might violate the prohibition of ever min ha’chai (eating a limb from a living animal),” Rabbi Halperin said.

The prohibition of eating a limb from a live animal is one of the seven Noahide Laws. The sixth law, forbidding the eating of a limb torn from a live animal, was stated explicitly to Noah.

You must not, however, eat flesh with its life-blood in it. Genesis 9:4

The sixth Noahide law requires killing an animal before eating from its flesh.

“One possible solution would be to take the cells from an animal after it has been properly slaughtered,” Halperin suggested. “Jews would need this to be done in a kosher manner, but even non-jews would need some form of slaughtering.”