^20:1 And Jehovah spoke to Joshua, saying, ^20:2Speak to the sons of Israel, saying, Assign for you^* the cities of refuge, of which I spoke to you^* by Moses, ^20:3 that the manslayer who kills any soul unintentionally and without knowledge may flee there. And they will be to you^* for a refuge from the avenger of blood. ^20:4 And he will flee to one of those cities and will stand at the entrance of the gate of the city and declare his case in the ears of the elders of that city. And they will take him into the city to them and give him a place, that he may dwell among them.

    ^20:5 And if the avenger of blood pursues after him, then they will not deliver up the manslayer into his hand, because he struck his neighbor without knowledge of it and did not hate him formerly. ^20:6 And he will dwell in that city, until he stands before the congregation for judgment, until the death of the high priest who will be in those days. Then the manslayer will return and come to his own city and to his own house, to the city from where he fled.

    ^20:7 And they set apart Kedesh in Galilee in the hill-country of Naphtali and Shechem in the hill-country of Ephraim and Kiriath-arba (what is Hebron) in the hill-country of Judah. ^20:8 And beyond the Jordan at Jericho eastward, they assigned Bezer in the wilderness in the plain out of the tribe of Reuben and Ramoth in Gilead out of the tribe of Gad and Golan in Bashan out of the tribe of Manasseh.

    ^20:9 These were the appointed cities for all the sons of Israel and for the stranger who travels among them, that whoever kills any soul unintentionally might flee there and not die by the hand of the avenger of blood until he stood before the congregation.