The Father Provides Cities of Refuge
Our Father sets apart six cities so that someone who kills accidentally can run somewhere and be heard before being killed in return. The rules are specific: state your case at the gate, stay until trial, and remain until the high priest dies.
20 1Then our Father spoke to Joshua:
2"Tell the Israelites: 'Designate for yourselves the cities of refuge I spoke to you through Moses, 3so anyone who kills someone by accident, unknowingly, may flee there—a refuge for you from the avenger of blood. 4Whoever flees to one of these cities is to stand at the entrance of the city gate and state his case to that city's elders. They will bring him in, give him a place, and let him live among them. 5If the avenger of blood pursues him, they must not hand the slayer over to him, because he struck his neighbor unknowingly, without prior hatred. 6He must stay in that city until he stands trial before the assembly, and until the high priest serving at that time dies. Then the killer may return to his own city and house, the town he fled from.'"
7They set apart Kedesh in Galilee, Naphtali's hills; Shechem, Ephraim's hills; and Kiriath-arba (Hebron), Judah's hills. 8Beyond the Jordan, east of Jericho, they gave Bezer in the wilderness on the plateau from Reuben's tribe, Ramoth in Gilead from Gad's tribe, and Golan in Bashan from Manasseh's tribe. 9These were the cities designated for all Israelites and foreigners living among them, so anyone who killed someone unintentionally could flee there and not die by the blood avenger's hand before standing trial before the assembly.
