So the priest gave him hallowed bread: for there was no bread there but the shewbread, that was taken from before the LORD, to put hot bread in the day when it was taken away.
literally one officiating · definite article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
gave
וַיִּתֶּןvai.yi.ten-
H5414
to give · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
hallowed
קֹ֑דֶשׁKo.desh
H6944
a sacred place or thing · noun, common masculine singular absolute
bread
לֶ֗חֶםLe.chem
H3899
food (for man or beast) · noun, common masculine singular absolute
shewbread
לֶ֤חֶםLe.chem
H3899
food (for man or beast) · noun, common masculine singular construct
taken
הַמּֽוּסָרִים֙ha.mu.sa.Rim
H5493
to turn off (literal or figurative) · definite article + verb, hophal passive participle, masculine plural absolute
before
הַפָּנִים֙ha.pa.Nim
H6440
the face (as the part that turns) · definite article + noun, common masculine plural absolute
LORD
יְהוָ֔הYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
put
לָשׂוּם֙la.Sum
H7760
to put (used in a great variety of applications · preposition + verb, qal infinitive construct
hot
חֹ֔םChom
H2527
heat · noun, common masculine singular absolute
bread
לֶ֣חֶםLe.chem
H3899
food (for man or beast) · noun, common masculine singular construct
day
בְּי֖וֹםbe.Yom
H3117
a day (as the warm hours) · preposition + noun, common masculine singular construct
away
הִלָּקְחֽוֹhi.la.ke.Cho
H3947
to take (in the widest variety of applications) · verb, niphal infinitive construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Luke 6:3-4 And Jesus answering them said, Have ye not read so much as this, what David did, when himself was an hungred, and they which were with him;
Leviticus 24:5-9 And thou shalt take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes thereof: two tenth deals shall be in one cake.
Matthew 12:3-4 But he said unto them, Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him;
Mark 2:25-27 And he said unto them, Have ye never read what David did, when he had need, and was an hungred, he, and they that were with him?
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on 1 Samuel 21:1-9
Here, I. David, in distress, flies in the tabernacle of God, now pitched at Nob, supposed to be a city in the tribe of Benjamin. Since Shiloh was forsaken, the tabernacle was often removed, though the ark still remained at Kirjath-jearim. Hither David came in his flight from Saul's fury (Sa1 21:1), and applied to Ahimelech the priest. Samuel the prophet could not protect him, Jonathan the prince could not. He therefore has recourse next to Ahimelech the priest. He foresees he must now be an exile, and therefore comes to the tabernacle, 1. To take an affecting leave of it, for he knows not when he shall see it again, and nothing will be more afflictive to him in his banishment than his distan…
there was no bread there--in the tabernacle. The removal of the old and the substitution of the new bread was done on the Sabbath (Lev 24:8), the loaves being kept warm in an oven heated the previous day.
Adam Clarke on 1 Samuel 21:6
So the priest gave him hallowed bread - To this history our Lord alludes, Mar 2:25, in order to show that in cases of absolute necessity a breach of the ritual law was no sin. It was lawful for the priests only to eat the shew-bread; but David and his companions were starving, no other bread could be had at the time, and therefore he and his companions ate of it without sin.
John Gill on 1 Samuel 21:6
So the priest gave him hallowed bread,.... Being satisfied with the account he gave of himself, and his young men, and of the lawfulness of it in case of necessity, acts of mercy being to be preferred to ritual services. Whether he gave him five loaves, as he desired, is not said; but the reason of his giving him such sort of bread is observed:
for there was no bread there; in the tabernacle, whatever might be in the house of the priest:
but the shewbread that was taken from before the Lord; from off of the shewbread table; and it seems to have been just taken off, it being sabbath day, and not as yet carried to the house of the priest, and divided among the other priests as usual; and whi…
The Church Fathers
Our Lord put forward the clear example of David, who was not accused either over this, as he was over something else. It was not permissible, he said, for David to eat [the holy bread] since he was not a priest. However, he was a priest, because he was a temple of the Spirit. Because they did not understand this, he openly proved them wrong with regard to their own [position]: "The priests were defiling the sabbath in the temple, and they were not guilty of sin." Another element is depicted for us there. Before David was persecuted, he partook of the bread with authority.
In many other testimonies of the divine Scriptures, Christ appears both as king and as priest. With good reason, therefore, he is declared to be David's son more frequently than he is said to be Abraham's son. Matthew and Luke have both affirmed this: the one viewing him [David] as the person from whom, through Solomon, his [Jesus'] lineage can be traced down, and the other taking him [David] for the person to whom, through Nathan, his [Jesus'] genealogy can be carried up. So he [David] did represent the role of a priest, although he was patently a king, when he ate the show bread. For it was not lawful for any one to eat that, except the priests alone.
The priest therefore gave him the sanctified bread. Because he heard that they were clean who were to receive it, he consented to give them the sanctified bread; which he would in no way dare to do if he had not recognized them as clean in all respects. But if such careful attention to purity was required of him who was to taste the typical bread sanctified by the hands of Moses, how much more necessary is it for those who, having accepted the bread sanctified into the sacrament of Christ's body in his holy and venerable hands, received in memory of his death, are to partake of it as a help to eternal life, to take care of their purity? Indeed, it is necessary for one always to remember the saying of the Apostle: "For whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily, will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. Let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup" (1 Cor. 11). The priest therefore gave him the sanctified bread.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Ahimelech — Brother of the king, the son of Ahitub and father of Abiathar (1 Sam. 22:20-23). He descended from Eli in the line of Ithamar. In 1 Chr. 18:16 he is called Abimelech, and is probably the same as…
Bread — Among the Jews was generally made of wheat (Ex. 29:2; Judg. 6:19), though also sometimes of other grains (Gen. 14:18; Judg. 7:13). Parched grain was sometimes used for food without any other…
Judges, Book of — Is so called because it contains the history of the deliverance and government of Israel by the men who bore the title of the “judges.” The book of Ruth originally formed part of this book, but about…
Quotations — From the Old Testament in the New, which are very numerous, are not made according to any uniform method. When the New Testament was written, the Old was not divided, as it now is, into chapters and…
Shewbread — Ex. 25:30 (R.V. marg., “presence bread”); 1 Chr. 9:32 (marg., “bread of ordering”); Num. 4:7: called “hallowed bread” (R.V., “holy bread”) in 1 Sam. 21:1-6. This bread consisted of twelve loaves made…
Betrayal · Of David, by Doeg — Of David, by Doeg
Bread · Sacred, called hallowed bread — Sacred, called hallowed bread
Confidence · .Ahimelech, by David — .Ahimelech, by David
Priests · Revenues of: Show-bread after its removal — Revenues of: Show-bread after its removal
Shewbread · Not lawful for any but the priests to eat, except in extreme cases — Not lawful for any but the priests to eat, except in extreme cases
Shewbread (Showbread) · General references
1 Samuel 21:6 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Sa1 21:1-2
David at Nob. - The town of Nob or Nobeh (unless indeed the form נבה stands for נבה here and in Sa1 22:9, and the ה attached is merely ה local, as the name is always written נב in other places: vid., Sa1 22:11, Sa1 22:19; Sa1 21:1; Isa 10:32; Neh 11:32) was at that time a priests' city (Sa1 22:19), in which, according to the following account, the tabernacle was then standing, and the legal worship carried on. According to Isa 10:30, Isa 10:32, it was between Anathoth (Anata) and Jerusalem, and in all probability it has been preserved in the village of el-Isawiyeh, i.e., probably the village of Esau or Edom, which is midway between Anata and Jerusalem, an hour from the latter, and…
gave him the holy bread: Jesus referred to this incident to teach that meeting people’s physical needs takes precedence over rigid adherence to sacred institutions (see Matt 12:1-8; Mark 2:23-28; Luke 6:1-5). • The Bread of the Presence consisted of twelve loaves (possibly one representing each tribe) that were laid out on a table in the Holy Place. They were replaced every Sabbath (see Exod 25:30; Lev 24:5-9).
Rashi on 1 Samuel 21:6
Have been kept from us. Withheld from us.4They seem to have treated even ordinary food as if it were holy food as in above 20:26.
The garments of the youths were pure. [Literally 'holy'] pure.
Even though it is an ordinary mission. And the bread, once it has been removed from the table, and they have burned the spoonfuls [of frankincense], it is almost common, because it has been excluded from [the prohibition of] מְעִילָה as soon as it becomes permitted for the kohanim [to eat].5The phrase וְהוּא דֶרֶךְ הֹל can then be translated as ‘it has already been made non-sacred’ referring to the showbreads [not to the mission], that they had lost some of their sanctity once the frankincense had bee…
Tabernacle · Was set up: In Nob — Was set up: In Nob
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
