But he said to them, Have ye not read what David did when he was hungry, and they that were with him?
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
How he entered into the house of God, and ate the shewbread, which it was not lawful for him to eat, nor for those with him, but for the priests only?
The Pharisees complain about His hungry disciples. Jesus answers by sending them back to a strange moment in Israel's history: David, on the run, ate bread that the law kept for priests alone. Why does the Lord defend an act He admits was "not lawful"?
The "house of God" David entered was not the temple. It was the tabernacle, and the loaves he took there were no ordinary food.
The ark was at Kirjath-jearim, while the tabernacle was at Nob, where the priests were as well. David came there, on the run from the king's anger and starving with hunger. He arrived on the Sabbath day, when the priests had changed the twelve loaves of showbread ("the bread of the face," or "of the presence"). God had told them to place these loaves on the golden table in the holy place every Sabbath. David asked the priest for some of the old loaves for himself and his companions. This was a bold thing to ask. The holy bread was unleavened, anointed with pure frankincense, and one of the most holy fire offerings to Jehovah. Only the priests ate it, and only in the holy place.
The Lord picks a case with no wriggle room. David broke a written statute, not a rule the rabbis had added. So what justified it?
This was not a doubtful point. It was not a question of human additions to the law, or of how people read the law. It was direct opposition to the statute in Leviticus. But how, then, could the Lord justify this? Was it just because they were hungry? Were they so far from any other help that setting aside the law was justified in their case? And was every hungry man entitled, along with David here, to set it aside?
Several things about that moment made it unlike any other hungry man's claim.
Strictly speaking, it was unlawful for David and his men to eat this bread, for it was the property of priests only. But there are matters that make a difference. First, the priesthood had seriously failed in Israel. Second, the tabernacle service was in the wrong place, not the place God had chosen. Third, the ark was not present. And fourth, the true king was in exile and hungry because of persecution. This last matter alone was reason for Ahimelech's giving the bread to David. The question of genuine need takes precedence over mere formal exactness.
The nation had driven God's anointed king out. One writer says that fact changed the standing of the holy bread itself.
David was rejected and on the run. Then the holy things belonging to the ceremonies God gave Israel stopped being holy. The sin was David's rejection, and this made the consecrated showbread common... The rejection of God's anointed had profaned all. This is the thought our Lord expressed to the Pharisees. They had rejected Him. They had no love for Him nor cared for Him. These hypocrites talked about keeping the Sabbath while they were rejecting the Lord of the Sabbath. How ridiculous!
So the charge of law-breaking lands back on the accusers.
Was this a sin? It was Saul's and the people's sin that there was no bread for David. It was their sin that the true anointed was an outcast. Their wickedness made common the bread that was holy at a holy time. If it had no sanctity in the presence of a rejected David, how much less in the presence of a rejected Christ?
Why did the priest hand over holy bread at all? One writer points to God's own grace behind the act.
The elect king is now rejected. He goes to the priest, who gives him the holy bread. This is the sovereign grace of God. God rises above the ordinances connected with blessing when that blessing is rejected — when He Himself is rejected in His chosen one, and in the power of His testimony. When this is the case, He sets faith above ordinances in His sovereign grace.
What was true for David is truer still for the One standing in front of the Pharisees.
Even this rule had to give way before the pressing need of David, the Lord's anointed... The true Lord's Anointed is "greater than the temple," even though that temple and its arrangements were important. David was in rejection when the incident took place, and our Lord was the rejected One when He spoke in Matthew 12. In these circumstances the needs of the Lord's Anointed came before legal regulations.
- Bread — twelve loaves stood before God's face. Priests changed them each Sabbath, and only priests ate them, in the holy place.
- Rejection — David ate that bread as the anointed king in exile. The nation's sin in casting him out is what made holy bread common.
- Grace — God did not defend His own ordinance against His own anointed. His sovereign grace rose above the ritual and set faith above ordinances.
- Need — genuine need came before formal exactness. At that time the priesthood had failed, the tabernacle stood in the wrong place, and the ark was missing.
- Greater — One greater than David and greater than the temple stood in front of the Pharisees. Their charge against His hungry disciples convicted them instead.