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Levitical city In the Hebrew Bible, the Levitical cities were 48 cities in ancient Israel set aside for the tribe of Levi, who were not allocated their own territorial land when the Israelites entered the Promised Land. Numbers 35:1-8 relates God's command to Moses to establish 48 cities for the Levites, of which six would also function as Cities of Refuge to which manslayers could flee. Each settlement was to comprise a walled city and the common land around it for pasture, measured radially as one thousand cubits in each direction,[1] or as a square measuring two thousand cubits along each side.[2] The land for the cities was to be 'donated' by the host tribe [3] and was allocated to the Levites according to their tribal sub-divisions. 13 cities were for the Aaronites. The six cities which were to be Cities of Refuge were Golan, Ramoth, and Bezer, on the east of the Jordan River,[4] and Kedesh, Shechem, and Hebron on the western side.[5] Locations of CitiesJoshua 21 recounts the fulfilment of God's command at the request of the Levite leaders. A further list is provided in 1 Chronicles 6:54-81. The following table reflects the list in Joshua 21:
InterpretationJohn Calvin suggested that the Levites had initially been 'overlooked' in the allocation of land on entry to the Promised Land, until the Levites brought forward a reminder of the divine commandment, making this an example of how:
However, the writer of the Pulpit Commentary disagreed:
This 'arrangement' was the fulfilment of Jacob's prophecy in Genesis 49:5-7 - I will scatter them (Simeon and Levi) in Israel - which was a punishment for Simeon and Levi's massacre of the men of Shechem.[9] The Levites could not be scattered amongst the cities of the other tribes until the other tribes had all been appointed to their territories after the entry into the Promised Land (Joshua 18–19). Matthew Henry commented that Jacob's condemnation of Levi became a blessing for Israel:
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