David Takes Consecrated Bread
1 Then David came to Nob, to Ahimelech the priest; and Ahimelech came trembling to meet David and said to him, "Why are you alone, and no one with you?" 2 David said to Ahimelech the priest, "The king has commissioned me with a matter and has said to me, ‘No one is to know anything about the matter on which I am sending you and with which I have commissioned you; and I have directed the young men to a certain place.’ 3 Now then, what 21:3 Lit is there under your hand?do you have on hand? Give 21:3 Lit into my handme five loaves of bread, or whatever can be found." 4 The priest answered David and said, "There is no ordinary bread 21:4 Lit under my handon hand, but there is consecrated bread, if only the young men have kept themselves from women." 5 David answered the priest and said to him, "Be assured, women have been denied to us as previously when I left and the 21:5 Lit vesselsbodies of the young men were consecrated, though it was an ordinary journey; how much more then will 21:5 Lit it be holy in the vesseltheir bodies be consecrated today?" 6 So the priest gave him consecrated bread; for there was no bread there except the bread of the Presence which was removed from its place before the Lord, in order to put hot bread in its place on the day it was taken away.