Deuteronomy 19:4-6

Revised Geneva Translation

⁴ “This also is the cause for which the manslayer shall flee there and live: whoever kills his neighbor ignorantly and did not hate him in time past —

⁵ “as he who goes to the forest with his neighbor to cut wood and his hand strikes with the axe to cut down the tree, if the head slips from the helve and hits his neighbor so that he dies—the same shall flee to one of the cities and live;

⁶ “lest the avenger of the blood follows after the manslayer while his heart is hot and overtakes him (because the way is long) and kills him, although he is not worthy of death because he did not hate him in time past.