Through the Bible – Day 57

₅₀While Israel was camped in the lowlands of Moab across the River Jordan from Jericho, the LORD told Moses ₅₁to give the people of Israel this message:

₁The LORD told Moses ₂to tell the people of Israel that their land in Canaan would have the following borders:

₁₃Then Moses told the people, “You will receive the land inside these borders. It will be yours, but the LORD has commanded you to divide it among the nine and a half tribes. ₁₄The tribes of Reuben, Gad, and East Manasseh have already been given their land ₁₅across from Jericho, east of the River Jordan.”

₁₆The LORD said to Moses, ₁₇“Eleazar the priest and Joshua son of Nun will divide the land for the Israelites. ₁₈One leader from each tribe will help them, _19-28and here is the list of their names:

₂₉These are the men the LORD commanded to help Eleazar and Joshua divide the land for the Israelites.

₁While the people of Israel were still camped in the lowlands of Moab across the River Jordan from Jericho, the LORD told Moses ₂to say to them:

When you receive your tribal lands, you must give towns and pastures to the Levi tribe. ₃That way, the Levites will have towns to live in and pastures for their animals. _4-5The pasture around each of these towns must be in the shape of a square, with the town itself in the centre. The pasture is to measure nine hundred metres on each side, with four hundred and fifty metres of land outside each of the town walls. This will be the Levites' pasture land.

₆Six of the towns you give them will be Safe Towns where a person who has accidentally killed someone can run for protection. But you will also give the Levites forty-two other towns, ₇so they will have a total of forty-eight towns with their surrounding pastures.

₈Since the towns for the Levites must come from Israel's own tribal lands, the larger tribes will give more towns than the smaller ones.

₉The LORD then told Moses ₁₀to tell the people of Israel:

After you have crossed the River Jordan and are settled in Canaan, ₁₁choose Safe Towns, where a person who has accidentally killed someone can run for protection. ₁₂If the victim's relatives think it was murder, they might try to take revenge. Anyone accused of murder can run to one of these Safe Towns for protection and not be killed before a trial is held.

₁₃There are to be six of these Safe Towns, ₁₄three on each side of the River Jordan. ₁₅They will be places of protection for anyone who lives in Israel and accidentally kills someone.

_16-18Suppose you hit someone with a piece of iron or a large stone or a dangerous wooden tool. If that person dies, then you are a murderer and must be put to death ₁₉by one of the victim's relatives. He will take revenge for his relative's death as soon as he finds you.

_20-21Or suppose you get angry and kill someone by pushing or hitting or by throwing something. You are a murderer and must be put to death by one of the victim's relatives.

_22-24But if you are not angry and accidentally kill someone in any of these ways, the townspeople must hold a trial and decide if you are guilty. ₂₅If they decide that you are innocent, you will be protected from the victim's relative and sent to stay in one of the Safe Towns until the high priest dies. ₂₆But if you ever leave the Safe Town ₂₇and are killed by the victim's relative, he cannot be punished for killing you. ₂₈You must stay inside the town until the high priest dies; only then can you go back home.

₂₉The community of Israel must always obey these laws.

₃₀Death is the penalty for murder. But no one accused of murder can be put to death unless there are at least two witnesses to the crime. ₃₁You cannot give someone money to escape the death penalty; you must pay with your own life! ₃₂And if you have been proved innocent of murder and are living in a Safe Town, you cannot pay to go back home; you must stay there until the high priest dies.

_33-34I, the LORD, live among you people of Israel, so your land must be kept pure. But when a murder takes place, blood pollutes the land, and it becomes unclean. If that happens, the murderer must be put to death, so the land will be clean again. Keep murder out of Israel!

₁One day the family leaders from the Gilead clan of the Manasseh tribe went to Moses and the other family leaders of Israel ₂and said, “Sir, the LORD has said that he will show what land each tribe will receive as their own. And the LORD has commanded you to give the daughters of our relative Zelophehad the land that he would have received. ₃But if they marry men from other tribes of Israel, the land they receive will become part of that tribe's inheritance and will no longer belong to us. ₄Even when land is returned to its original owner in the Year of Celebration, we will not get back Zelophehad's land—it will belong to the tribe into which his daughters married.”

₅So Moses told the people that the LORD had said:

_10-11Mahlah, Tirzah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Noah the daughters of Zelophehad obeyed the LORD and married their uncles' sons ₁₂and remained part of the Manasseh tribe. So their land stayed in their father's clan.

₁₃These are the laws that the LORD gave to Moses and the Israelites while they were camped in the lowlands of Moab across the River Jordan from Jericho.

₁Jesus and his disciples crossed Lake Galilee and came to shore near the town of Gerasa. ₂When he was getting out of the boat, a man with an evil spirit quickly ran to him ₃from the graveyard where he had been living. No one was able to tie the man up any more, not even with a chain. ₄He had often been put in chains and leg irons, but he broke the chains and smashed the leg irons. No one could control him. ₅Night and day he was in the graveyard or on the hills, yelling and cutting himself with stones.

₆When the man saw Jesus in the distance, he ran up to him and knelt down. ₇He shouted, “Jesus, Son of God in heaven, what do you want with me? Promise me in God's name that you won't torture me!” ₈The man said this because Jesus had already told the evil spirit to come out of him.

₉Jesus asked, “What is your name?”

The man answered, “My name is Lots, because I have ‘lots’ of evil spirits.” ₁₀He then begged Jesus not to send them away.

₁₁Over on the hillside a large herd of pigs was feeding. ₁₂So the evil spirits begged Jesus, “Send us into those pigs! Let us go into them.” ₁₃Jesus let them go, and they went out of the man and into the pigs. The whole herd of about two thousand pigs rushed down the steep bank into the lake and drowned.

₁₄The men taking care of the pigs ran to the town and the farms to spread the news. Then the people came out to see what had happened. ₁₅When they came to Jesus, they saw the man who had once been full of demons. He was sitting there with his clothes on and in his right mind, and they were terrified.

₁₆Everyone who had seen what had happened told about the man and the pigs. ₁₇Then the people started begging Jesus to leave their part of the country.

₁₈When Jesus was getting into the boat, the man begged to go with him. ₁₉But Jesus would not let him. Instead, he said, “Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you and how good he has been to you.”

₂₀The man went away into the region near the ten cities known as Decapolis and began telling everyone how much Jesus had done for him. Everyone who heard what had happened was amazed.