Later text
"There is no common bread on hand," the priest replied, "but there is some consecrated bread—provided that the young men have kept themselves from women."
Intertextuality Pair
1 Samuel 21:4 → Deuteronomy 23:10-11
Allusion
Earlier text
If any man among you becomes unclean because of a nocturnal emission, he must leave the camp and stay outside. When evening approaches, he must wash with water, and when the sun sets he may return to the camp.
Significance
When Ahimelech gives David the consecrated bread on the condition that "the young men have kept themselves from women," he applies the purity principle from Deuteronomy 23:10-11, which requires that a man rendered unclean (טָמֵא, tame) by a nocturnal emission must go outside the camp and remain unclean until evening. Ahimelech's question about sexual abstinence reflects the priest's responsibility to distinguish between the holy and the common (Lev 10:10), applying camp purity regulations to the question of who may eat consecrated bread. The episode shows how priestly judgment could extend Torah regulations to novel circumstances through analogical reasoning.
- Found via
- No public domain commentary confirmation available
- Reference Type
- Allusion
- Connection Method(s)
- Analogy — the priest's condition ("kept themselves from women") applies Deuteronomy's camp-purity regulation analogically to sacred food, extending the Torah's holiness categories to a case the statute itself never addresses — the text's own "analogical reasoning" in priestly judgment
Linked Mentions 1