1
And Jehovah spake unto Joshua , saying,
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Speak to the children of Israel , saying, Assign you the cities of refuge , whereof I spake unto you by Moses ,
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that the manslayer that killeth any person unwittingly [and] unawares may flee thither: and they shall be unto you for a refuge from the avenger of blood .
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And he shall flee unto one of those cities , and shall stand at the entrance of the gate of the city , and declare his cause in the ears of the elders of that city ; and they shall take him into the city unto them, and give him a place , that he may dwell among them.
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And if the avenger of blood pursue after him, then they shall not deliver up the manslayer into his hand ; because he smote his neighbor unawares, and hated him not beforetime.
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And he shall dwell in that city , until he stand before the congregation for judgment , until the death of the high priest that shall be in those days : then shall the manslayer return , and come unto his own city , and unto his own house , unto the city from whence he fled .
7
And they set apart Kedesh in Galilee in the hill -country of Naphtali , and Shechem in the hill -country of Ephraim , and Kiriath-arba (the same is Hebron ) in the hill -country of Judah .
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And beyond the Jordan at Jericho eastward, they assigned Bezer in the wilderness in 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 .
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These were the appointed cities for all the children of Israel , and for the stranger that sojourneth among them, that whosoever killeth any person unwittingly might flee thither, and not die by the hand of the avenger of blood , until he stood before the congregation .