Joshua - Chapter 20
THE
LORD also spake unto Joshua, saying,
2 Speak
to the children of Israel, saying, Appoint out for you cities of refuge,
whereof I spake unto you by the hand of Moses:
3 That
the slayer that killeth any person unawares and unwittingly may
flee thither: and they shall be your refuge from the avenger of blood.
4 And
when he that doth flee unto one of those cities shall stand at the entering of
the gate of the city, and shall declare his cause in the ears of the elders of
that city, they shall take him into the city unto them, and give him a place,
that he may dwell among them.
5 And if
the avenger of blood pursue after him, then they shall not deliver the slayer
up into his hand; because he smote his neighbour unwittingly, and hated him not
beforetime.
6 And he
shall dwell in that city, until he stand before the congregation for judgment, and
until the death of the high priest that shall be in those days: then shall the
slayer return, and come unto his own city, and unto his own house, unto the
city from whence he fled.
7 And
they appointed Kedesh in Galilee in mount Naphtali, and Shechem in mount
Ephraim, and Kirjath-arba, which is Hebron, in the mountain of Judah.
8 And on
the other side Jordan by Jericho eastward, they assigned Bezer in the
wilderness upon 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.
9 These
were the cities appointed for all the children of Israel, and for the stranger
that sojourneth among them, that whosoever killeth any person at
unawares might flee thither, and not die by the hand of the avenger of blood,
until he stood before the congregation.
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