1 When Yahweh your God will cut off the nations, whose land Yahweh your God gives you, and you succeed them, and dwell in their cities, and in their houses;
2 you will set apart three cities for you in the midst of your land, which Yahweh your God gives you to possess it.
3 You will prepare for yourself the way, and divide the borders of your land, which Yahweh your God causes you to inherit, into three parts, that every manslayer may flee there.
4 And this is the case of the manslayer, that will flee there and live: whoever kills his fellow man unawares, and did not hate him in time past;
5 as when a man goes into the forest with his fellow man to cut wood, and his hand fetches a stroke with the ax to cut down the tree, and the head slips from the handle, and hits his fellow man, so that he dies; he will flee to one of these cities and live:
6 or else if the avenger of blood pursues the manslayer, while his heart is hot, and overtakes him, because the way is long, and strikes him mortally; whereas he wasn't worthy of death, inasmuch as he did not hate him in time past.
7 Therefore I command you, saying, You will set apart three cities for yourself.
8 And if Yahweh your God enlarges your border, as he has sworn to your fathers, and gives you all the land which he promised to give to your fathers;
9 if you will keep all [of] this commandment to do it, which I command you this day, to love Yahweh your God, and to walk ever in his ways; then you will add three more cities for yourself, besides these three:
10 that innocent blood will not be shed in the midst of your land, which Yahweh your God gives you for an inheritance, and so blood will be on you.
11 But if any man hates his fellow man, and lies in wait for him, and rises up against him, and strikes him mortally so that he dies, and he flees into one of these cities;
12 then the elders of his city will send and fetch him from there, and deliver him into the hand of the avenger of blood, that he may die.
13 Your eye will not pity him, but you will put away the innocent blood from Israel, that it may go well with you.
14 You will not remove your fellow man's landmark, which they of old time have set, in your inheritance which you will inherit, in the land that Yahweh your God gives you to possess it.
15 One witness will not rise up against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sins: at the mouth of two witnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses, will a matter be established.
16 If an unrighteous witness rises up against any man to testify against him of wrongdoing,
17 then both the men, between whom the controversy is, will stand before Yahweh, before the priests and the judges that will be in those days;
18 and the judges will make diligent inquisition: and see if the witness is a false witness, and has testified falsely against his brother;
19 then you{+} will do to him, as he had thought to do to his brother: so you will put away the evil from the midst of you.
20 And those who remain will hear, and fear, and will from now on commit no more of any such evil in the midst of you.
21 And your eyes will not pity; life [will go] for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.