What Does the Bible Say about Cloning?

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Updated July 07, 2023

What does the Bible say about cloning? You probably didn’t think you’d ever have to ask it. Your gut reaction may be, “Well, cloning seems bad because of the moral implications.” Implications like, would a clone have a soul?” Is a clone an abomination in the eyes of God? What does a Creator think about someone distorting its creation (cough, cough, AI art and AI-generated stories…).

It shouldn’t surprise us that the Bible has little to say about cloning. The technology didn’t exist in ancient times. But the Bible does have a lot to say about the sanctity of life and counterfeits.

We know that Satan can’t create; he can only take what’s already been created and modify it slightly. This point often comes to mind when someone asks, “What does the Bible say about cloning?”

So let’s dive in to see a Scriptural view of this hot-button issue.

What Does “God Created Humanity in His Image” Mean for Cloning?

God created humanity in his image. That means that every person who has been created is knit together in their mother’s womb. They have attributes of God. They have a sanctity of life that we should seek to preserve.

So what happens when we, as humans, create life via cloning? What does it do to God’s image?

Let’s explain God’s design for the human body biblically.

The Bible tells us that our bodies are not our own (1 Corinthians 6:19). They belong to the person who made them, God. Outside Scripture, various thinkers have affirmed this point from their secular perspectives. For example, one of the dialogues written by pre-Christian philosopher Plato features a man who argues against people committing suicide because their bodies do not belong to themselves.

Since our bodies do not belong to ourselves, we can reasonably assume that others’ bodies do not belong to us either. That would fall under the category of cloning—we cannot misuse our bodies for cloning or convince others to go through with the process.

What Does the Biblical View of Life’s Sanctity Mean for Cloning?

Furthermore, in addition to our bodies not being our own, the cloning process is steeped in controversy. Making a clone requires collecting and destroying embryos, living beings, to make it happen.

The Bible takes a staunch stance of embracing life at every stage, so destroying embryos would directly violate its stance. Cloning would mean destroying life to, in a perverted way, create it.

What Does the Biblical View of Evil Mean for Cloning?

Another key problem with cloning is it manipulates what has already been created. It aims to replace the natural reproduction process with a distorted version allowing humans to control what they don’t naturally control.

The fact that cloning distorts a good thing (having children) puts it under the Bible’s view of evil. A recurring point in Christian theology is that Satan doesn’t create things. He distorts what already exists. For example:

- Satan begins tempting Eve to eat the forbidden fruit by asking a question that cultivated doubt: “Did God really say ‘you must not eat from any tree in the Garden?” (Genesis 3:1). Satan begins to cast doubt on truth, then builds on this point to make a lie.

- Isaiah 14 indicates that Satan rebelled because he saw God’s glory and wanted it for himself.

- Exodus 7 observes the Pharoah’s magicians could do many of the same signs and wonders that Moses did, but Moses’ signs were greater.

- Lust takes the love God created and distorts it to sinful ends.

Various people have noted other ways that Satan parodies good things. Witchcraft parodies the power that God gives to believers. Satan’s number in Revelation is 666 (six is one number short of seven, generally used in the Bible for discussing holiness).

We could go on, but the point is that Satan cannot create on his own. Satan doesn’t create new life. He distorts it.

The distortion matters because we know humans cannot strictly create anything either. We do what C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien called “sub-creation,” finding healthy ways to imitate God’s creation progress to make healthy things reflecting his holiness. Satan cannot reach that level either—he distorts and misuses, his ideas reflecting only his distorted view.

Augustine used this fact to argue that evil is not an equal force opposing evil. Rather, evil is goodness distorted—a lesser, misused force.

Given how cloning imitates something good but distorts it by taking life to accomplish its goal, it’s perhaps worth noting the Bible’s closest thing to mentioning cloning is Old Testament child sacrifices. Pagan cultures offering children to false gods in exchange for what they hoped would be blessings.

Since the Bible’s teachings give a vision of life that opposes cloning, we can move on to the next question: do we have historical records of how Christians have reacted?

How Have Christians Historically Reacted to Cloning?

Cloning has only existed since the late 1800s in an experiment involving sea urchin embryos. So to say that there’s a lack of historical interactions of Christians with cloning is an understatement.

The cloning that seemed to get the world’s attention happened a century later with Dolly the sheep (a successfully reproduced sheep clone).

In the 1990s to early 2000s, cloning’s legality became a key question—President Bill Clinton announced he would support a bill to ban cloning in 1997. As the decade continued and different countries debated whether to legalize or ban it, several Christians appeared to speak out against cloning.

In 1998, Roman Catholic theologian Russell B. Connors Jr. argued that there is no moral reason behind the issue of cloning. That no Christian, in good conscience, could participate in it.

In 2002, Pope John Paul II said that even if something good could come from cloning, the bad far outweighed the good.

In 2009, Eastern Orthodox Reverend Demetri Demopulos argued the moral issues with cloning are the same raised by embryonic stem cell research—both potentially leading to growing body parts to keep as spare parts. Demopulos said, “We cannot store living human beings in a ‘organ bank’ to make withdrawals as we will.”

It’s very hard to find a Christian who can back up cloning—no matter what the benefits may be.

Why Is Christianity so Opposed to Cloning?

There are more arguments why Christians shouldn’t support cloning other than simply, “It’s not nice to play with God’s things.” Here are other points to consider.

We can’t play God.

Especially when it comes to the cloning of humans, the creation of humanity is in God’s hands. He is the one who created things in Genesis 1 and called his creation good. Anytime humanity attempts to play God, it ends in disaster. See the Tower of Babel for an example.

Cloning brings up the issue of a soul.

For centuries, the idea of the soul has confounded us. When does it appear? Most orthodox Christians would say it appears the moment a sperm meets an egg and attaches to the uterine lining. There are even flashes of light documented at the moment of fertilization, which some have said they believe is the soul “sparking.”

If we’re hacking embryos apart to create living beings, are we creating beings without a soul? Or a corrupted soul? There are severe theological consequences for messing with souls.

Cloning raises the question, “Why would you even want to do this”?

It’s difficult to mention cloning without someone referencing the ever-famous Jurassic Park quote. One scientist observes that the company that made dinosaurs from embryos was so obsessed with “if we could” that they didn’t stop to think, “Should we?”

As someone who loves science topics, I love “What if?” What if we jumped into a black hole? (Highly don’t recommend . . . you’d die a very painful death) What if we could create wormholes in space-time? And so on.

It’s exciting to think, “What if?”

But at the same time, if a Christian wants to clone another human being, I’d ask them this question. I’d wonder why they would want to do this in the first place. There are clear consequences for doing so.

We should steer clear of even the thought of cloning another human being. There are no benefits that outweigh the moral repercussions.

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Hope Bolinger is an acquisitions editor at End Game Press, book editor for hire, and the author of almost 30 books. More than 1500 of her works have been featured in various publications. Check out her books at hopebolinger.com for clean books in most genres, great for adults and kids. Check out her editing profile at Reedsy.com to find out about hiring her for your next book project.