But Jacob did not send Joseph’s brother Benjamin with his brothers, ¹  for he said, ²  “What if some accident ³  happens ⁴  to him?”

If you take ¹  this one from me too and an accident happens to him, then you will bring down my gray hair ²  in tragedy ³  to the grave.’ ⁴ 

But if he does not do it with premeditation, ¹  but it happens by accident, ²  then I will appoint for you a place where he may flee.

Anyone who accidentally killed someone ¹  without hating him at the time of the accident ²  could flee to one of those cities and be safe.

Now this is the law pertaining to one who flees there in order to live, ¹  if he has accidentally killed another ²  without hating him at the time of the accident. ³ 

Otherwise the blood avenger will chase after the killer in the heat of his anger, eventually overtake him, ¹  and kill him, ²  though this is not a capital case ³  since he did not hate him at the time of the accident.

But Jacob ¹  replied, “My son will not go down there with you, for his brother is dead and he alone is left. ²  If an accident happens to him on the journey you have to make, then you will bring down my gray hair ³  in sorrow to the grave.” ⁴ 

But keep an eye on it. If it should go up by the way of its own border to Beth Shemesh, then he has brought this great calamity on us. But if that is not the case, then we will know that it was not his hand that struck us; rather, it just happened to us by accident.”