Bible Verses About Homicide

Bezer in the wilderness on the plateau belonging to the Reubenites, Ramoth in Gilead belonging to the Gadites, or Golan in Bashan belonging to the Manassites.

then you are to set apart for yourselves three cities within the land that the LORD your God is giving you to possess.

You are to build roads for yourselves and divide into three regions the land that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, so that any manslayer can flee to these cities.

Now this is the situation regarding the manslayer who flees to one of these cities to save his life, having killed his neighbor accidentally, without intending to harm him:

If he goes into the forest with his neighbor to cut timber and swings his axe to chop down a tree, but the blade flies off the handle and strikes and kills his neighbor, he may flee to one of these cities to save his life.

Otherwise, the avenger of blood might pursue the manslayer in a rage, overtake him if the distance is great, and strike him dead though he did not deserve to die, since he did not intend any harm.

This is why I am commanding you to set apart for yourselves three cities.

And if the LORD your God enlarges your territory, as He swore to your fathers, and gives you all the land He promised them,

and if you carefully keep all these commandments I am giving you today, loving the LORD your God and walking in His ways at all times, then you are to add three more cities to these three.

Thus innocent blood will not be shed in the land that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, so that you will not be guilty of bloodshed.

Then the LORD said to Joshua,

“Tell the Israelites to designate the cities of refuge, as I instructed you through Moses,

so that anyone who kills another unintentionally or accidentally may flee there. These will be your refuge from the avenger of blood.

When someone flees to one of these cities, stands at the entrance of the city gate, and states his case before its elders, they are to bring him into the city and give him a place to live among them.

Now if the avenger of blood pursues him, they must not surrender the manslayer into his hand, because that man killed his neighbor accidentally without prior malice.

He is to stay in that city until he stands trial before the assembly and until the death of the high priest serving at that time. Then the manslayer may return to his own home in the city from which he fled.”

So they set apart Kedesh in Galilee in the hill country of Naphtali, Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim, and Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the hill country of Judah.

And beyond the Jordan, east of Jericho, they designated Bezer on the wilderness plateau from the tribe of Reuben, Ramoth in Gilead from the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan from the tribe of Manasseh.

These are the cities appointed for all the Israelites and foreigners among them, so that anyone who kills a person unintentionally may flee there and not die by the hand of the avenger of blood prior to standing trial before the assembly.