1 Samuel 21:1-5 ▼

1 David came to Nob to the priest Ahimelech. Ahimelech came trembling to meet David, and said to him, “Why are you alone, and no one with you?”

2 David said to the priest Ahimelech, “The king has charged me with a matter, and said to me, ‘No one must know anything of the matter about which I send you, and with which I have charged you.’ I have made an appointment with the young men for such and such a place.

3 Now then, what have you at hand? Give me five loaves of bread, or whatever is here.”

4 The priest answered David, “I have no ordinary bread at hand, only holy bread—provided that the young men have kept themselves from women.”

5 David answered the priest, “Indeed women have been kept from us as always when I go on an expedition; the vessels of the young men are holy even when it is a common journey; how much more today will their vessels be holy?”