Joshua 20

And God spoke to Joshua, saying,

“Speak to the sons of Israel, saying, ‘Give for yourselves the cities of refuge that I spoke to you by the hand of Moses

for the fleeing there of the one killing {by} striking a person by mistake without intent. And they will be for you for a refuge from the avenger of blood. \*

And he shall flee to one from these cities and stand {at} the entrance of the gate of the city, and he shall speak his words in the ears of the elders of that city. And they shall gather him into the city to themselves, and they shall give to him a place, and he shall dwell with them.

And if the avenger of blood pursues after him, then they shall not deliver the one having killed into his hand. For without knowledge he struck his neighbor, and he was not hating him from yesterday {or} the third day.

And he shall dwell in that city until his standing to the face of the congregation for judgment, until the death of the great priest who is in those days. Then the one having killed may return and enter into his city and into his house, into the city that he fled from there.’” \*

And they set apart Kedesh in Galilee in the hill country of Naphtali, and Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim, and Kiriath Arba (it is Hebron) in the hill country of Judah.

And from the other side of the Jordan, to Jericho from the sunrise, they gave Bezer in the wilderness on the plateau from the tribe of Reuben, and Ramoth in Gilead from the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan from the tribe of Manasseh.

These were the cities of appointment for all of the sons of Israel and for the sojourner who sojourned in the midst of them, for the fleeing there of anyone striking a person by mistake, and he would not die by the hand of the avenger of blood until he stood to the face of the congregation. \*