Joshua 20:1-9
20 And Jehovah spoke to Joshuaʽ, saying
2 “Tell the sons of Israel ‘Institute the asylum cities of which I spoke to you by Moses,
3 for the homicide who strikes down a person inadvertently
4 to flee to;
5 you shall have them as an asylum from the blood-reclaimer,
6 * and the homicide shall not die by the blood-reclaimer till he stands before the congregation for trial.’”
7 And they hallowed Kedesh in the Mark, in the highland of Naphtali, and Shekem in the highland of Ephraim, and Kirjath-Arbogh (that is, Hebron) in the highland of Judah.
8 And on the east side of the Jordan at Jericho they instituted Beser in the wilderness, in the level, out of the tribe of Reuben, and Ramoth in Gilead out of the tribe of Gad, and Golan in the Bashan out of the tribe of Manasseh.
9 These were the appointed cities for all the sons of Israel and for the immigrants that lived among them, for everyone who struck down a person inadvertently to flee to and not die by the blood-reclaimer till he stood before the congregation.
Footnotes
^ 20:6 Var. (verse 4) And he shall flee to one of these cities and stand at the gate of the city and state his case in the hearing of the elders of the city, and they shall take him into the city as an inmate and give him a place, and he shall live with them, (verse 5) and when the blood-reclaimer pursues him they shall not give the homicide up to him, because he struck his neighbor down without knowing it, not having previously hated him. (verse 6) And he shall live in that city till he stands before the congregation for trial, till the death of the high priest that there shall be in those days; then the homicide shall go back and come into his own city and home, the city he had fled from.
