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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?"
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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 2 with the young men for such and such a place.
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Now then, what have you at hand? Give me five loaves of bread, or whatever is here."
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The priest answered David, "I have no ordinary bread at hand, only holy bread--provided that the young men have kept themselves from women."
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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?"
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So the priest gave him the holy bread; for there was no bread there except the bread of the Presence, which is removed from before the
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Now a certain man of the servants of Saul was there that day, detained before the
8 David said to Ahimelech, "Is there no spear or sword here with you? I did not bring my sword or my weapons with me, because the king's business required haste." 9 The priest said, "The sword of Goliath the Philistine, whom you killed in the valley of Elah, is here wrapped in a cloth behind the ephod; if you will take that, take it, for there is none here except that one." David said, "There is none like it; give it to me."