In a standard Chumash, at the end of very parashah, there is a comment from the Masoretes that tells the reader how many verses were in that particular parashah and provides a mnemonic for easily memorizing that number. In general, these mnemonics consists of a word/phrase from the parashah, or the name of a Biblical character, either of which has a gematria that equals the sum of the verses in the parashah. However, for Parashat Vayishlach, the Masoretes gave the word klitah — which literally means “surviving/saving” — as the mnemonic for remembering that its total sum of verses equals one-hundred and fifty-four. The word klitah is neither a word that appears in the parashah, nor the name of a Biblical character, but it does echo the theme of Jacob dividing his camp so that if Esau attacked one group, the rest of will be “for survival” (Gen. 32:8). A similar theme appears in the Haftara to Vayishlach, which foretells that Mount Zion will be a place “for survival” in the final showdown with the House of Esau (Ovadia 1:17). But the word for “survival” in these Biblical passages is pleitah — not klitah.
In general, the Targumim translate inflections of the Hebrew words klitah and pleitah into the same Aramaic word for “salvation” (shizba/shaziv and its cognates). This suggests that in some ways, those two Hebrew terms can be viewed as synonymous, as they both refer to “saving” in a general way. Nonetheless, this essay will show that there is a fine line between the deeper meanings of these two Hebrew terms: the core meaning of klitah refers to being saved by being “received” or “collecting into” a safe space, while the core meaning of pleitah refers to being saved by being “expelled” from a place of danger.
The term klitah per se does not actually appear in the Bible, but two forms of its root KUF-LAMMED-TET do appear in the Bible. One form is the noun miklat (whose initial MEM is not really part of the root), which means “place of receiving, i.e., refuge.” This word appears twenty times in the Bible, all in the books of Numbers and Joshua, except for two cases in Chronicles (I Chron. 6:42, 6:52). This word invariably appears relates to the Ir Miklat (“City of Refuge”) into which somebody who murders by mistake may flee and escape the wrath of his victim’s vengeful relatives. This clearly refers to the concept of “saving,” as such cities “receive” those who flee into them and offer legal protection and sanctuary to save murderers from retribution.
In Modern Hebrew, the term miklat came to refer to a “bomb shelter,” which likewise “receives” those fleeing air raids and protects them. Along these lines, the noun klitah in Modern Hebrew means “reception,” in the sense of “comprehending” an idea by receiving it in one’s brain, as well as in the sense of cell phone reception and immigration absorption.
The second form of the root KUF-LAMMED-TET in the Bible is in the word kalut (Lev. 22:23), which refers to non-Kosher animals whose hooves are “not split.” This word also appears in the Mishnah (Bechorot 6:7, 7:6) in the same context. It relates to the ideas discussed above in the sense that something “received” by a safe shelter is protected from harm by being “closed in,” so a kalut refers to an animal whose hooves are likewise “closed” and not “split/open.”
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