Question IV. How long did the same cities of refuge protect a refugee?

The time [is] to be distinguished. For, before the careful examination of the case, all who had not been openly and manifestly voluntary [deliberate] homicides, and who had in some way proved their innocence to the city of refuge, [the city] received — and [those] received [it] protected — until the whole case should be more diligently and fully adjudicated. But in this adjudication the refugee himself was pronounced either guilty or innocent. If “guilty,” he was owed [handed over] for punishment to that city to which the slaughter pertained, as [was] said in the previous question, from Deut. 19:11 & 12. If “innocent,” he was indeed absolved; but nevertheless [he] could not yet return to his former city and his own home — because, although [a verdict] had now been pronounced concerning his innocence, nevertheless, by divine concession, up to a certain time (which was defined [to last] up to the death of the high priest), he could still be killed by the kindred of the man whom he had slain by chance, wherever at last he might be caught, outside the city of refuge. For after such a refugee’s absolution, and the sentence passed concerning his innocence, [he] is not dismissed from the city of refuge, but [rather] is led back into it from the tribunals, and there [he] is commanded to remain until the death of the high priest (Num. 35:25). And straightway [it] is added (v. 26, 27, 28): “If the slayer be found outside the bounds of the cities which are assigned to the exiles, and be killed by him who is the avenger of blood, he who kills him shall be without blame. For the fugitive ought to have resided in the city until the death of the high priest. But after he is dead, the manslayer shall return into his own land.” For then [after the high priest’s death] [it] was in no way permitted to the kinsmen of the slain man to kill that slayer, whom the death of the high priest had freed from the city of refuge and from exile. But in two ways can the death of the high priest — as [that] of any other [person] too — be considered: namely, in respect of the agent and of the patient [the one acting and the one acted upon]. (In the former way [it] seems to be initiated, in the latter to be finished.) But just as, in natural [things], from the end of motion and change [it] is established what each thing is, and of what sort, or how great, or where [it is], so in moral [things], from the outcome of actions [it] is decided of what kind each thing is to be reckoned — as is clear in striking [percussio], which, if it brings death, is reckoned “homicide”; but if otherwise, only “a beating” or “a wounding,” as the jurisprudents note in the explanation of the Aquilian law. Therefore the death of the high priest is to be regarded in respect of him who died; and from this [it] comes about, that if someone had killed that [high priest] by chance, he [the killer] could return from exile not by his [that high priest’s] death, but by [that] of the following high priest — because the end [outcome] of that [first] death pertains already to the following Pontificate, which (in the old testament) came to someone immediately, not (as among us) by election and votes, but by hereditary right; so that, by reason of this right [of succession], there was never any lack of a high priest, [and] the seat was never vacant — even if some [interval] of time flowed between for his consecration and anointing. Let Tostatus be seen, q. 17 & 18 here, and Num. ch. 20. But why, after the manslayer’s innocence [was] ascertained and acquitted, he still had to be an exile — the cause is laid upon the hardness of the Jews. For since [they] were of a stubborn mind, and very eager for vengeance, and therefore [were] greatly goaded by the death of their [kinsmen], God indulged them in this: that for some time the manslayer — even [though] innocent — should be separated and away from their eyes. Tostatus, q. 15 & 23.