1The LORD also told Joshua: 2“Tell the Israelites, ‘Assign the cities of refuge of which I spoke to you through Moses, 3So that anyone who kills any person unintentionally and without intent may flee there; and they shall have refuge from the avenger of blood. 4And when the one who flees to one of those cities shall stand at the entrance of the gate of the city, and declare his cause to the elders of that city, then they shall take him into the city, and give him a place where he may dwell among them. 5And if the avenger of blood pursues him, then they shall not turn the slayer over to him, because he struck his neighbor without premeditation, and did not hate him beforehand. 6And he shall dwell in that city, until he stands before the congregation for judgment, and until the death of the high priest that serves in those days; then shall the slayer return to his own city, and his own house, to the city from which he fled.

7And they assigned Kedesh in Galilee in Mount Naphtali, Shechem in Mount Ephraim, and Kiriath-arba, which is Hebron, in the hill country of Judah. 8And on the east side of the Jordan by Jericho, they assigned Bezer in the wilderness on the plain out of the tribe of Reuben, Ramoth in Gilead out of the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan out of the tribe of Manasseh. 9These were the six cities assigned for all the Israelites, and for the stranger who sojourns among them, that whoever kills any person without intent might flee there, and not die at the hand of the avenger of blood, until he has stood before the congregation.