The city of refuge offers a place for those who had
accidentally killed a person to go and receive protection. There were several
scattered across the nation giving the accused a greater chance of being saved.
The city was a place of safety from the family who lost their loved one. The
congregation would judge the case and if they found the person had committed
murder then the person was killed, but if not the person was not put to death.
The one caveat was the person had to stay in the city of refuge until the death
of the high priest.
One can try to guess, why an innocent person had to
stay in the city and not allow to go home. However, my own guess is there was a
two-fold reason. The first is for the family who realizes that the person did
commit murder but there wasn't enough evidence to convict the person. This
would give the family a sense of justice. The second is to acknowledge that
human life is worth something, and even a life take accidentally cost society
something. There is a price which society pays when a human is lost before
their time. In other situations, God required even accidental losses be
reimbursed but how do you do that in the case of human life? The answer was,
when the death was caused by a person, they stay in the city of refuge until
the death of the high priest. There is a feeling of fairness about it, though I
will have to admit if you were the person having to live out the rest of your
life there, it may not seem so. However, at that place, you did have freedom
and you couldn't be killed.
I think it shows justice and, if I could use the
term, the fairness of God. It's something to think about.
Jos 20:1-9
(1) The LORD also spake unto Joshua, saying,
(2) Speak to the children of Israel, saying, Appoint out for you cities of refuge, whereof I spake unto you by the hand of Moses:
(3) That the slayer that killeth any person unawares and unwittingly may flee thither: and they shall be your refuge from the avenger of blood.
(4) And when he that doth flee unto one of those cities shall stand at the entering of the gate of the city, and shall declare his cause in the ears of the elders of that city, they shall take him into the city unto them, and give him a place, that he may dwell among them.
(5) And if the avenger of blood pursue after him, then they shall not deliver the slayer up into his hand; because he smote his neighbour unwittingly, and hated him not beforetime.
(6) And he shall dwell in that city, until he stand before the congregation for judgment, and until the death of the high priest that shall be in those days: then shall the slayer return, and come unto his own city, and unto his own house, unto the city from whence he fled.
(7) And they appointed Kedesh in Galilee in mount Naphtali, and Shechem in mount Ephraim, and Kirjatharba, which is Hebron, in the mountain of Judah.
(8) And on the other side Jordan by Jericho eastward, they assigned Bezer in the wilderness upon 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.
(9) These were the cities appointed for all the children of Israel, and for the stranger that sojourneth among them, that whosoever killeth any person at unawares might flee thither, and not die by the hand of the avenger of blood, until he stood before the congregation.
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