Numbers 35:1-7

1 Then God spoke to Moses on the Plains of Moab at Jordan-Jericho:

2 "Command the People of Israel to give the Levites as their part of the total inheritance towns to live in. Make sure there is plenty of pasture around the towns.

3 Then they will be well taken care of with towns to live in and pastures for their cattle, flocks, and other livestock.

4 "The pasture surrounding the Levites' towns is to extend 1,500 feet in each direction from the city wall.

5 The outside borders of the pasture are to measure three thousand feet on each of the four sides - east, south, west, and north - with the town at the center. Each city will be supplied with pasture.

6 "Six of these towns that you give the Levites will be asylum-cities to which anyone who accidentally kills another person may flee for asylum. In addition, you will give them forty-two other towns -

7 forty-eight towns in all, together with their pastures.

Numbers 35:1-7 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO NUMBERS 35

Though the tribe of Levi had no part in the division of the land, yet cities out of the several tribes are here ordered to be given them to dwell in, to the number of forty eight, Nu 35:1-8, six of which were to be cities of refuge, Nu 35:9-15, but not for wilful murderers, in whatsoever way they might kill a man, Nu 35:16-21, but for such who had killed a man unawares, Nu 35:22-24, and several rules are given relating to such persons, Nu 35:25-29, but no satisfaction was to be taken in case of murder, nor to excuse a person's return to his own house before the death of the high priest, who had fled to a city of refuge, that so the land might not be defiled, Nu 35:30-34.