5. As when a man goes into the wood with his neighbor to hew wood, and his hand strikes with the ax to cut down the tree, and the head slips off the handle and lights on his neighbor and kills him–he may flee to one of those cities and live;
6. Lest the avenger of the blood pursue the slayer while his [mind and] heart are hot with anger and overtake him, because the way is long, and slay him even though the slayer was not worthy of death, since he had not been at enmity with him previously.
7. Therefore I command you, You shall set apart three [refuge] cities.
8. And if the Lord your God enlarges your territory, as He has sworn to your fathers to do, and gives you all the land which He promised to your fathers to give,
9. If you keep all these commandments to do them, which I command you this day, to love the Lord your God and to walk always in His ways, then you shall add three other cities to these three,
10. Lest innocent blood be shed in your land, which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance, and so blood guilt be upon you.
11. But if any man hates his neighbor and lies in wait for him, and attacks him and wounds him mortally so that he dies, and the assailant flees into one of these cities,
12. Then the elders of his own city shall send for him and fetch him from there and give him over to the avenger of blood, so that he may die.
13. Your eyes shall not pity him, but you shall clear Israel of the guilt of innocent blood, that it may go well with you.
14. You shall not remove your neighbor's landmark in the land which the Lord your God gives you to possess, which the men of old [the first dividers of the land] set.
15. One witness shall not prevail against a man for any crime or any wrong in connection with any sin he commits; only on the testimony of two or three witnesses shall a charge be established.