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.