Joshua 20

20 ¹ Then our Father spoke to Joshua:

² "Tell the Israelites: Set apart for yourselves the cities of refuge that I spoke to you about through Moses, ³ so that anyone who kills a person accidentally and unintentionally may flee there. They will be a refuge for you from the avenger of blood. ⁴ When someone flees to one of these cities, he is to stand at the entrance of the city gate and state his case in the hearing of the elders of that city. Then they will take him into the city, give him a place, and let him live among them.

⁵ If the avenger of blood pursues him, they must not hand the one who caused the death over to him, since he struck his neighbor unintentionally and had not hated him beforehand. ⁶ He is to stay in that city until he has stood trial before the assembly, and until the death of the high priest serving in those days. Then the one who caused the death may return to his own town and his own home, the town he fled from.

⁷ So they set apart Kedesh in Galilee in the hill country of Naphtali, Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim, and Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the hill country of Judah.

⁸ And beyond the Jordan, east of Jericho, they appointed Bezer in the wilderness on the plateau from the tribe of Reuben, Ramoth in Gilead from the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan from the tribe of Manasseh.

⁹ These were the cities appointed for all the Israelites and for the foreigner residing among them, so that anyone who killed a person accidentally could flee there and not die by the hand of the avenger of blood before standing trial before the assembly.