1And יהוה spoke to Yehoshua, saying,

2“Speak to the children of Yisra’ĕl, saying, ‘Appoint for yourselves cities of refuge, of which I spoke to you through Mosheh,

3for the slayer who kills any being accidentally, unintentionally, to flee there. And they shall be your refuge from the revenger of blood.

4‘And he shall flee to one of those cities, and stand at the entrance of the gate of the city, and declare his case in the hearing of the elders of that city. And they shall take him into the city as one of them, and give him a place, and he shall dwell among them.

5‘And when the revenger of blood pursues him, they do not give the slayer into his hand, because he smote his neighbour unintentionally, and did not hate him beforehand.

6‘And he shall dwell in that city until he stands before the congregation for right-ruling, and until the death of the one who is high priest in those days. Then let the slayer return and come to his own city and his own house, to the city from which he fled.’ ”

7So they set apart Qeḏesh in Galil, in the mountains of Naphtali, and Sheḵem in the mountains of Ephrayim, and Qiryath Arba, that is Ḥeḇron, in the mountains of Yehuḏah.

8And beyond the Yardĕn, by Yeriḥo eastward, they appointed Betser in the wilderness on the plain, from the tribe of Re’uḇĕn, and Ramoth in Gil‛aḏ, from the tribe of Gaḏ, and Golan in Bashan, from the tribe of Menashsheh.

9These were the cities appointed for all the children of Yisra’ĕl and for the stranger who sojourned in their midst, for anyone accidentally killing any being, to flee there, and not die by the hand of the revenger of blood until he stood before the congregation.