¹⁰ “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, ^(A)When you cross the Jordan into the land of Canaan,

² “Say to the people of Israel, ^(A)‘Appoint the cities of refuge, of which I spoke to you through Moses, ³ that the manslayer who strikes any person without intent or unknowingly may flee there. They shall be for you a refuge from the avenger of blood. ⁴ He shall flee to one of these cities and shall stand ^(B)at the entrance of the gate of the city and explain his case to the elders of that city. Then they shall take him into the city and give him a place, and he shall remain with them. ⁵ And if the avenger of blood pursues him, they shall not give up the manslayer into his hand, because he struck his neighbor unknowingly, and did not hate him in the past. ⁶ And he shall remain in that city ^(C)until he has stood before the congregation for judgment, until the death of him who is high priest at the time. Then the manslayer may return to his own town and his own home, to the town from which he fled.’”

Laws Concerning Cities of Refuge

19 “When ^(A)the Lord your God cuts off the nations whose land the Lord your God is giving you, and you dispossess them and dwell in their cities and in their houses, ^2 (B)you shall set apart three cities for yourselves in the land that the Lord your God is giving you to possess.

⁹ for you have not as yet come to ^(A)the rest and to the inheritance that the Lord your God is giving you.

² “Command the people of Israel, and say to them, When you enter ^(A)the land of Canaan ^(B)(this is the land that shall fall to you for an inheritance, the land of Canaan as defined by its borders),

² “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When you come into ^(A)the land that I give you, the land shall keep a Sabbath to the Lord.

³⁴ “When you come into the land of Canaan, which I give you ^(A)for a possession, and I put a case of leprous disease in a house in the land of your possession,