Here’s an ethical issue and Jewish source response:

Case

Someone tried to sell a kidney online.  In America and many other countries, selling organs is against the law.  The belief is that all organs should be donated and then given out in an order created by the medical community based on need and likelihood of survival.  The doctors say that they fear that rich people will begin forcing people to sell them organs.  Others argue that it limits their freedom to be able to do with their organs what they want.

Should selling organs be a matter of personal choice?

Answer

There are two issues surrounding this question.  First is the permissibility of donating organs and second in the issue of selling them.

[a] With respect to the principle of donating organs, Jewish law permits it with a few conditions.  The Torah, in Leviticus 13:5, tells us v’Hai ba-Hem, “You should live by the Mitzvot.”  The rabbis learn from this verse that the supreme value of Jewish life is that mitzvot are to perpetuate human survival.  The journal Medical Ethics and Judaism tells us that there is no objection to organs being donated for the purpose of saving a life.  The burial of the complete body would be set aside for this principle.  The Comprehensive Guide to Medical Halakhah by Rabbi Abraham S. Abraham says that as long as the donor does not suffer permanent harm, organ donation is a most “meritorious act.”  

[b] This Comprehensive Guide to Medical Halakhah by Rabbi Abraham S. Abraham also gives us some guidance as to the second part of the question.  It is there where he writes, “a person who during his lifetime sells one of his kidneys for transplantation into a seriously ill patient because of poverty or debts nevertheless performs the mitzvah of saving a life,” as Rabbi Abraham says in the name of Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach.  Yet Rabbi Abraham laments a state of affairs in which someone is resorting to such measures for financial survival. 

[c] It seems to me the practice of selling body parts should be frowned upon for, the linchpin of the arguments is that the body belongs to us and we can do with it what we want to.  Judaism does not support that idea.  The body is a holy vessel that is given to us by God, and because of its holiness it is not ours to make profit from the way we make profit from CDs or baseball cards.  Organ donation is a great mitzvah, and the organs should go to the ones who would benefit from this mitzvah, not to those whose wallets are the thickest.

Joel Grishaver, “You Be the Judge 3”, pgs. 23-24

Used with permission from Joel Grishaver