Joshua 20

Someone’s death at the hands off another, even if done unintentionally, is an emotion charged incident where people would very readily look for someone to blame. It is clear they might even hire or appoint someone to met out vengeance on the guilty party. In God’s wisdom and justice, He knew there should be a distinction in law, even if not in emotion/reaction, between homicide and manslaughter. For that second category He commanded the Israelites to establish cities of refuge for the responsible party to run to, to find protection and a cooling off period to make sure the facts of the case could be discovered and the rule of law and not emotion would prevail. That distinction has made its way into our justice system too, showing that God’s wisdom is valuable to all.