Joshua 21:1-14 ▼

1 Then the heads of households of the Levites came near to Eleazar the priest and to Joshua the son of Nun and to the heads of households of the tribes of the sons of Israel.

2 And they spoke to them at Shiloh in the land of Canaan, saying, “Yahweh commanded by the hand of Moses to give us cities to live in, with their pasture lands for our cattle.”

3 So the sons of Israel gave the Levites from their inheritance these cities with their pasture lands, according to the command of Yahweh.

4 Then the lot came out for the families of the Kohathites. And the sons of Aaron the priest, who were of the Levites, received thirteen cities by lot from the tribe of Judah and from the tribe of the Simeonites and from the tribe of Benjamin.

5 Now the rest of the sons of Kohath received ten cities by lot from the families of the tribe of Ephraim and from the tribe of Dan and from the half-tribe of Manasseh.

6 And the sons of Gershon received thirteen cities by lot from the families of the tribe of Issachar and from the tribe of Asher and from the tribe of Naphtali, and from the half-tribe of Manasseh in Bashan.

7 The sons of Merari according to their families received twelve cities from the tribe of Reuben and from the tribe of Gad and from the tribe of Zebulun.

8 So the sons of Israel gave by lot to the Levites these cities with their pasture lands, as Yahweh had commanded by the hand of Moses.

9 They also gave from the tribe of the sons of Judah and from the tribe of the sons of Simeon these cities which are here mentioned by name;

10 and they were for the sons of Aaron, one of the families of the Kohathites, of the sons of Levi, for the lot was theirs first.

11 So they gave them Kiriath-arba (Arba being the father of Anak), that is, Hebron, in the hill country of Judah, with its pasture lands all around it.

12 But the fields of the city and its villages they gave to Caleb the son of Jephunneh as his possession.

13 Thus to the sons of Aaron the priest they gave Hebron, the city of refuge for the manslayer, with its pasture lands, Libnah also with its pasture lands,

14 Jattir with its pasture lands, Eshtemoa with its pasture lands,