As would creating the jar file and deleting the manifest file. I'm looking for a jar command line - what switches, options, what parameters - would create a jar file without a manifest file.

Contents of a JAR file Java applications and libraries can contain hundreds of different files, including compiled Java source code, a manifest file, XML-based configuration data, JSON-based data ...

JEP 238: Multi-Release JAR Files extends the JAR file format to allow multiple, Java-release-specific versions of class/resource files to coexist in the same archive.