David Takes Consecrated Bread

21 Then David came to ^(A)Nob, to Ahimelech the priest; and Ahimelech ^(B)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, ‘^(C)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 ^[a]do you have on hand? Give ^[b]me five loaves of bread, or whatever can be found.” ⁴ The priest answered David and said, “There is no ordinary bread ^[c]on hand, but there is ^(D)consecrated bread, if only the young men have ^(E)kept themselves from women.” ⁵ David answered the priest and said to him, “^(F)Be assured, women have been denied to us as previously when I left and the ^[d](G)bodies of the young men were consecrated, though it was an ordinary journey; how much more then will ^[e]their bodies be consecrated today?” ⁶ So ^(H)the priest gave him consecrated bread; for there was no bread there except the ^(I)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.

⁷ Now one of the servants of Saul was there that day, detained before the Lord; and his name was ^(J)Doeg the Edomite, the ^(K)chief of Saul’s shepherds.

⁸ David said to Ahimelech, “Now is there no spear or sword ^[f]on hand? For I brought neither my sword nor my weapons ^[g]with me, because the king’s matter was urgent.” ⁹ Then the priest said, “^(L)The sword of Goliath the Philistine, whom you ^[h]killed ^(M)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.”

¹⁰ Then David set out and fled that day from Saul, and went to ^(N)Achish king of Gath. ¹¹ But the ^(O)servants of Achish said to him, “Is this not David, the king of the land? ^(P)Did they not sing of this one as they danced, saying,

¹² David ^(Q)took these words ^[i]to heart and greatly feared Achish king of Gath. ¹³ So he ^(R)disguised his sanity while in their sight and acted insanely in their ^[j]custody, and he scribbled on the doors of the gate, and drooled on his beard. ¹⁴ Then Achish said to his servants, “Look, you see the man is behaving like an insane person. Why do you bring him to me? ¹⁵ Do I lack insane people, that you have brought this one to behave like an insane person in my presence? Shall this one come into my house?”