1 Samuel 21:1-9 ▼

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, 'Let no one 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 therefore, what do you have on hand? Give me five loaves of bread, or whatever can be found.|

4 The priest answered David and said, |There is no ordinary bread on 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, |Surely women have been kept from us as previously when I set out and the vessels of the young men were holy, though it was an ordinary journey; how much more then today will their vessels [be holy]?|

6 So the priest gave him consecrated [bread]; for there was no bread there but the bread of the Presence which was removed from before the LORD, in order to put hot bread [in its place] when it was taken away.

7 Now one of the servants of Saul was there that day, detained before the LORD; and his name was Doeg the Edomite, the chief of Saul's shepherds.

8 David said to Ahimelech, |Now is there not a spear or a sword on hand? For I brought neither my sword nor my weapons with me, because the king's matter was urgent.|

9 Then the priest said, |The sword of Goliath the Philistine, whom you killed in the valley of Elah, behold, it is wrapped in a cloth behind the ephod; if you would take it for yourself, take [it]. For there is no other except it here.| And David said, |There is none like it; give it to me.|