Deuteronomy 4:42

42 where one could flee who committed manslaughter and killed his neighbor accidentally without previously hating him. He could flee to one of these cities and stay alive:

Deuteronomy 4:42 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 4:42

That the slayer might flee thither
For refuge; the slayer of a man, but not any slayer, but

which should kill his neighbour unawares;
by accident to him, without any design and intention to kill him; ignorantly, as the Septuagint version; and so Onkelos:

and hated him not in times past;
it having never appeared that there had been a quarrel between them, and that the slayer had shown any enmity to the man slain any time before the fact, or bore a grudge against him, or spite unto him:

and that, fleeing unto one of these cities, he might live;
in peace and safety unto his own death, or unto the death of the high priest, when he was released from his confinement to the city of his refuge, and might return to his tribe, house, family, and possessions.

Deuteronomy 4:42 In-Context

40 Keep His statutes and commands, which I am giving you today, so that you and your children after you may prosper and so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you for all time."

41 Then Moses set apart three cities across the Jordan to the east,

42 where one could flee who committed manslaughter and killed his neighbor accidentally without previously hating him. He could flee to one of these cities and stay alive:

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

44 This is the law Moses gave the Israelites.