JoshuaChapter 20

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¹Then the LORD said to Joshua, ²"Tell the Israelites to choose the cities of refuge. I told you about them through Moses. ³This is so that anyone who kills a person by mistake, without meaning to, may run there. These cities will keep you safe from the avenger of blood. ⁴Someone may run to one of these cities. He will stand at the entrance of the city gate. He will tell his side of the story to the elders there. When he does, they must take him into the city. They must give him a place to live among them. ⁵If the avenger of blood chases him, the elders must not hand the man over to him. That is because he killed his neighbor by accident. He had not hated him before. ⁶He must stay in that city until he stands trial before the people. He must also stay until the high priest who is serving at that time dies. Then the man may go back to his own home, in the town he ran from." ⁷So they set apart Kedesh in Galilee, in the hill country of Naphtali. They set apart Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim. They also set apart Kiriath-arba, which is Hebron, in the hill country of Judah. ⁸East of the Jordan, across from Jericho, they chose three more. They chose Bezer on the high desert plain, from the tribe of Reuben. They chose Ramoth in Gilead, from the tribe of Gad. And they chose Golan in Bashan, from the tribe of Manasseh. ⁹These cities were chosen for all the Israelites and for the foreigners living among them. They were chosen so that anyone who killed a person by mistake could run there. Then the avenger of blood could not kill him before his trial before the people.